


Lost In Translation

by Frostfur



Series: Translation Series [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Family Feels, Family Fluff, Family Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-20 18:22:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16142888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frostfur/pseuds/Frostfur
Summary: When Kara's pod crashes down on planet earth, Clark is the first one there to greet her. What happens if she only speaks Kryptonian, Which he does not, chaos ensues. Started as a crack fic ended up being a beloved nano project. Family fic . Sequel up.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Author's Note: I did write this on my phone with an external keyboard, autocorrect does not like my fast typing and will have often changed words for me and since during editing they are not exactly highlighted some changes will have been missed. My apologies, however I hope you enjoy my crack fic turned novel.

Clark wasn’t paying attention to the world around him, a state he wasn't often in. normally listening out for any signs of danger he could help with. But this article he was working on was due in a few hours and he was stuck in his rather open cubicle surrounded by the hustle of the newsroom unable to use his super speed to aid in its speedy finish. So far his speed had helped him keep his job at the daily planet and keep up with his new superman duties.

Sometimes though he did need to switch off, superman doesn't exactly bring in a weekly paycheck that helps him keep his new Metropolis apartment. City rent isn't cheap and he hadn't been a reporter long.

He was knocked out of his conditioned slow typing by a co-worker knocking into his back running toward the small office TV they had in the corner displaying the news channel.

Tuning in his super hearing he sat up a little

“A large meteoroid has entered earth's atmosphere and its orbit is decaying fast. Scientists have projected it will land in the Nevada area and urges residents to be aware as so far it hasn't broken up in the atmosphere and remains about the size of the motorbike.” The female host announced

“Here's hoping our new local superhero also could be a national savior” a male host added as she finished the announcement.

Clark couldn't see the screen but he could hear the reaction of the newsroom muttering about if superman would be going to help.

Clark looked to his report and wished not for the first time he could take the large cumbersome computer to the bathroom so he could type and edit so much faster to finish the damn story.

In a meteor scenario of it possibly crashing down on a populated area Clark couldn’t let innocents he could save down just to finish a small news story on the crime decline in Gotham.

He was 200 words short of the target word count, quickly looking around to see if anyone was watching he wrote out on paper the article and then the rest of his article in under a minute. He could move faster but he had found years ago that above a certain speed it was highly likely to set the paper on fire. His ferocious childhood crayon scribbles had ruined many floorboards in the Kent household.

Having finished he turned to the only other person in the newsroom who might help him. A fellow intern at the paper.

“Hey Jimmy?” Clark asked poking his head over the short divider between their desks

“What do you want Clark” Jimmy replied not taking his eyes off the screen in front of him as he moved his mouse.

“My computers frozen and I can't seem to get it to do anything” as he said that he pulled the mouse and keyboard wires free from the computer with his foot “I was going to head to IT to see if they can help me”

Jimmy did look at Clark then, “Why are you telling me this?”

Clark looked sheepish, “Sorry you didn't need the whole story, short part is can you give this to Mr White if he comes looking for me while I’m gone?”

He stood up and handed Jimmy the hand written article

“Sure” Jimmy said accepting the papers, “best hurry up fixing that computer though, you know white hates handwritten”

Clark nodded and quickly headed toward the lift. Stepping in on his own luckily he selected the option for the top floor instead of the IT department in the basement. He could redirect the meteor back into space or into an unpopulated area and be back for deadline. Or so he hoped.

\---  
Flying now as superman in the upper atmosphere with nothing to shadow the sun at this height and the thinner air he was able to pick up immense speed.

Spotting the meteor with his superior vision he nearly fell out the sky. It was another pod, just like his own hurtling through the atmosphere in a slow decaying pattern so as not to slam into the ground damaging the precious cargo inside.

Speeding up Clark caught up to the pod and tried to look inside but the glass was too dark for him to see. Flying alongside the pod he guided it into a safe landing in an unpopulated area outside of Nevada.

So much for him getting back to his job to finish that report. But this was far more important. Another kryptonian.

Barely able to contain himself now the pod had stopped moving. Clark ripped off the pods door uncaring of what it may do to the person within.

Of all the things he expected to be inside, a small terrified 12 year old was not one of them.

“Dur El? Te?” She questioned hesitantly sitting up and squinting at his face as the yellow sun shined in her eyes.

“That was my father” Clark replied, “I’m Kal El?” He introduced, “Who are…” He never finished asking who she was as she jumped up to stand on her seat to look him right in the face

“Kal el?” she repeated then began to panic, a string of foreign kryptonian words falling out of her mouth.

“Woah hey easy, I don't speak Kryptonian!” Clark tried to calm her down and he flew up a little so he could put a hand on her shoulder

But that just seemed to make things worse. Panic seemed to have set in and with her gesturing to his feet he guessed he hadn't helped things. He went to grab her other shoulder but she slapped him away.

Clark had never been hit that hard in his life. He flew quite a distance away and smacked into a sand dune. His face stung and he could taste copper in his mouth.

He looked back toward the girl and saw her floating upwards desperately trying to grab hold of the pod she had arrived in but the metal was bending in her hands and eventually she had no grip and continued her ascent slowly upwards. She was still screaming out in Kryptonian as she did.

He flew up and steadied her in the air. She stared at him then the house symbol on his chest before collapsing in a dead faint.

Clark held her in his arms before he sped of to the only place he could think. Towards his mother.

His mum was in when he arrived at the kent farm luckily alone as he was so distracted he didn't think to check before landing in full Superman attire.

“Clark” she exclaimed, “What have I told you about...oh”

Martha's objections died in her throat as she spied the small girl in his arms.

“She's Kryptonian” he blurted and he moved to lay her on the sofa, “Her pod, I just helped it crash”

“Clark” she exhaled understanding how huge this was for him to have another Kryptonian

“Who is she” she breathed, taking in the girl's appearance and her matching house symbol embossed into her nightgown.

“Well I didn't… She doesn't speak English” Clark finished, “But she said my father's name” he remembered, “I think she thought I was him”

Martha exhaled deeply, “So that's all you have to say she's Kryptonian?” She started, “A similar pod and the fact she said your father's name?”

Clark nodded

Martha sighed, “I know this is a big deal and she looks harmless but Clark, she looks barely a teenager and your twenty four, you were a baby when your planet was destroyed…”

Clark shook his head, “I understand this is strange but I can feel it somehow… She's family”

Martha looked down upon the still girl and then back to her son.

“There's a place for her here Clark but not right now”

Clark looked at his mother a little wounded.

“Now don't look at me like that, what I mean is she needs Kal El not Clark Kent and where does superman go when he needs guidance”

A look of realisation crossed Clark's face, “The fortress! Kal X can translate!”

Martha smiled and the next second her son was gone with a ghost of a kiss she could feel on her cheek.

“Boys” she tutted slightly before walking back to finish making her cup of coffee.

\---

Clark felt a little stupid for not thinking of the fortress first as he laid the girl down in front of the door so he could lift the dwarf star key.

Opening up the fortress he laid Kara down in his Pringles pod and called for Kal X.

The robot he had come to heavily rely on since becoming superman was not far away

“Good evening MAster Kal” he began, “what can I help you with today?”

Clark gestured over to his Kryptonian pod, “I don't quite know how to ask but is she Kryptonian?”

Kal X Flores over to where she was lying and seemed to do a visual then deeper scan

He made a explaining beeping noise of joy

“Master Kal” he strayed as excited as Clark had ever seen him, “This is Mistress Kara!”

“Kara?”

“Yes Kara Zor El, your cousin on your father's side, according to your records she was sent behind your pod so she could assist you in your growth on this planet”

“However when you activated me at the age you were with no knowledge of krypton or anything else I feared the word for Kara”

“But why is she so young?” Clark asked, “I mean if she was sent after me before the planet was destroyed she should be older?”

Kal X looked almost fallen “I cannot answer that Master Kal, but that is indeed your elder cousin Kara Zor El”

Clark looked to the small girl in the pod and felt a happy glow inside of him. Living family.   
Not that he didn't love his adopted parents but having a part of his planet after so long that wasn’t a robot or a hologram was a little overwhelming

He was still in a little bit of a daze when Kara began to stir

Kal X flew straight to her side, “Mistress Kara!” He greeted, “ I am pleased to see you are awake”

Kara looked at the small robot in confusion before a string of words Clark did not understand flew from her lips. He caught the word krypton but that was all.

The conversation between the two went back and forth awhile as Kal X switched to Kryptonian.

Kara went from looking confused to relaxed upon being able to converse but as the conversation progressed he could see confusion on her face again as she looked to him

“Kal El?” She asked and he nodded she said more Kryptonian then looked to Kal

“She said to say you look a lot like your father” Kal X filled him in

Clark smiled, “Thanks”

Kara looked to Kal X to repeat the word in Kryptonian then tried to replicate it in English butchering the sound as she tried to remember how Clark had said it and failing.

“Why does Kal not speak Kryptonian?” Kara asked Kal X

“He has only just begun his path of learning about his heritage, I myself was only activated this last sun cycle to assist in Kal El's work under the yellow sun”

“The yellow sun” Kara repeated, “My mother warned me it would gift me with extraordinary powers, is that Kal Els work?”

“Yes Mistress he has just begun to use them to aid the inhabitants of this world”

“He does not know of Krypton?”

“He knows krypton was destroyed, who his parents were but otherwise he grew up as a human the inhabitants of this world knowing little”

Kara hung her head a little “I was meant to be there to guide him” she said sadly, “but my pod was delayed I didn't want to leave my mother and the explosion…” Kara began to cry “ it basted me straight into the phantom zone”

She couldn't talk anymore though as she cried and large blue covered arms wrapped around her in a hug as Kara heard Kal X relay their conversation to Kal El

He was so big now. He had only been a few months old when Lara had last seen him which to her was only yesterday on a launch pad.

When her crying subsided Clark pulled back a little

“Ehrosh” he said completely butchering a Kryptonian greeting. But it had the desired effect Kara laughed before repeating it back correctly to him.

Now everything was a lot calmer Clark took a moment to just relax and be quiet for awhile.

Kara cut through the silence asking Kal X a question and Clark shook himself out of his calm space.

Kal X repeated what Kara was saying to Clark “She's asking about earth and why she feels different “

“Feels different?” Clark asked

“Stronger and lighter?” Kal X tried to repeat but the robot looked to be struggling, “ I am sorry Master Kal there is no translation for what Mistress Kara is saying “ if a robot could look forlorn it would be Kal X in this moment “I think she doesn't know about the effects of the yellow sun”

“Yellow sun?” Clark questioned now he was confused

“Yes Master Kal the radiation of the earth's yellow sun Kryptonians can absorb and this allows them greater power than those of earth”

Kal X was also translating for Kara at the same time using his screen as a Kryptonian ticket tape.

Kara spoke again and Kal X paused replied the. Translated for Clark

“Mistress Kara is exactly right Krypton's red sun doesn't affect your cells in the same way”

Clark looked stunned, a view never been seen before from the Man of Steel’s face when he was in costume

“So all Kryptonians were like normal humans on Krypton no flying or X Ray vision?” Clark asked

He had never thought to question it before. The hologram of his father had never told him and he had just assumed this was what a Kryptonian was

Kal X had been translating again for Kara and Clark heard her exclaim then Kal X said

“Mistress Kara is most excited about the flying and I think now understands what was happening earlier after she landed”

Ah yeah she did fly into the air that would be scary if you had never done it before.

Kal X cut through Clark's thoughts “Mistress Kara is rather upset and is wondering why you know so little about Kryptonians”

Clark didn't have an answer for her. He had essentially been brought up human. He did not even know his Kryptonian name until his 16th birthday and he had had little interest in his powers until recently when he had begun to use them as Superman. In his youth he had occasionally used them anonymously but never explored the reason he had them. He just had had them since he was a baby if his adoptive mothers stories of him flying about as a baby naked and peeing while spinning around the kitchen were anything to go by

She really liked telling that story. Few people could actually hear it so the ones that could heard it often.

“I grew up human” that was his only response after a time. “I knew nothing else but humanity and that I was a little different”

Kara looked sad for a moment before asking Kal X something to relay to Clark

“Mistress Kara says she is happy to continue with her primary mission and educate you on everything Krypton including the language and in exchange she would like to learn about and how to use her new abilities”

Clark frowned a little “You are rather young to be using them full time, you are on earth now and I would be best to blend in as a human like I did in my younger years”

Again this was relayed through to Kara who nodded thoughtfully.

“Kal X would you be able to come with us back to the farm and help teach Kara English? I wouldn't want to keep her here and the farm would be best” He paused before adding “And tell Kara were going to go fly to my adoptive mother's home” he didn’t want to make her jump by just shooting off with her.

Clark held out his hand as Kal X relayed the message to Kara. She smiled and grabbed his hand and then jumped in the air but seemed a little put out when she didn't stay in the air

Clark just stepped into the air and floated Kara tried to copy him but failed again.   
Clark bent and lifted her into his arms and the flew up up and away from the fortress Kal X trailing behind him.

It was dusk when they landed at the farm, having to fly slower for Kal X to keep up. On the way Kara had been silent and her only exclamation was when she saw a flock of birds passing in the opposite direction which she seemed fascinated by nearly twisting out of Clarks grip as he flew.

As they landed at the farm the porch light was on and a sweep of his X ray vision revealed a large chicken in the oven and his adoptive mother standing in the kitchen.

Kara seemed fascinated by everything but she stayed silent just staring around her. Silence greeted them to the door and this time Clark politely knocked and listened as his mother tittered and then came to answer the door.

“I knew you would be back for Din-oh” she cut off as she got the door open fully when she saw Kara

“Clark?” She asked slowly looking up from Kara to his face.

“Mum, this is Kara Zor-El my cousin” Clark simply introduced

“And we're sure about that?” She questioned again

“I’m sure” Clark responded

“Well of your sure” Martha mumbled and opened the door wider to let them all inside. Kal X bobbing along the ceiling of the porch.

“Don't be so pessimistic mother” Clark chimed in as they entered

“I'm allowed to be do you have any idea how many times time travelers came to mess you up as a baby” she paused as she motioned for them to sit down at the dinner table “If I wasn't pessimistic you wouldn't be alive” she finished and began serving up for the three of them

“She's quiet” Martha observed as she felt out the food

“Kara doesn't speak English yet” Clark replied, “that's why I brought Kal X to help her”

Martha made a noncommittal noise and began to serve the food to Clark and Kara carrying the plates to them.

Kara looked at her good and spoke a string of Kryptonian. Kal X soon translated for her.

“Mistress Kara has recited the feasting of family as is traditional on krypton for a meal among families who have not seen her for awhile”

Martha nodded and seemed just a little shocked, “Your language is beautiful” she responded and she watched as the teen flushed with the compliment as she read it off Kal X who had resumed his ticker tape translations for faster communication.

Martha swore a little as as took the chicken out the oven, “Clark it's not quite finished would you mind giving it a zap?” She walked around the kitchen island holding the chicken with oven gloved hands and placed the tray down on the table infringement of Clark

“Sure” he smiled at his mother as he went to move his glasses that he wasn't wearing then used his heat vision.

He wasn't quite expecting Karas reaction to his eyes. Screaming out in Kryptonian in fear she backed her chair far away from the table and had moved to use it as a shield

Both Clark and Martha were more than a little confused at the reaction.

“Are you sure she's your cousin, because that is a rather strange reaction to Heat Vision” Martha commented mentally figuring out where hr nearest weapon was

“She's never seen it before apparently Kryptonians only have powers under the yellow sun, Krypton was under a red sun”

Martha's eyebrow raised. “That's news” she murmured under her breathe, “Also explains your addiction to sunny D”

Clark ignored her and focuses on getting his cousin out from behind the chair where she was now shaking in fear. Calling Kal X down as well to ask her what was wrong.

It took awhile but through Kal X eventually they got to the position where Kara was sat on his lap and eating between explains what was wrong and why his heat vision had made her react that way.

It took awhile as their was still the large language barrier but Clark found out that Kara's mother was a prominent judge and Kara had been kidnapped by some of her less than happy friends of prisoners she had put away and they had burnt her with their heat vision when she tried to escape once.

Kara showed Clark the scar on her back moving the large nightgown she was wearing to reveal the scar. Clark winced a little and put her nightgown back into place.

“You can't be hurt like that here, look” and Clark picked up a fork and stabbed it hard Into his arm and the fork bent then he handed it to Kara who put her hand down and tried the same thing tentatively to her arm and smiled as it didn't hurt her.

Martha raised an eyebrow at the ruining of her cutlery but didn't say anything as she continued to eat.

Kara ate fast when she finally felt comfortable on Clarks knee and Clark let her have more of his own deciding he could get takeout later if he got hungry which would be very likely plus it was possible his mum had-

“Pudding?” Martha asked

She might as well have read his mind. Martha got up, “Clark could you clear up the plates while i grab the pudding”

“Sure” Clark agreed and he quickly super sped the dishes away and into the washer without Kara having to move.

Kara laughed as her hair whipped violently in the wind Clark create do.

Martha chuckled to herself as she grabbed some ice cream from the freezer and then three spoons

“Which flavour do you think Karas going to like” Martha asked as she handed out the spoons and plopped the ice cream tub in front of them all and sitting down.

“Well long as it's not Strawberry!” Clark joked and handed Kara a spoon and they all dug in. Clark knew his mother preferred vanilla as when he was younger they always bought Neapolitan ice cream as Clark loved strawberry his mum loved vanilla and his dad used to devour the chocolate.

At first Kara tried all flavours before deciding that the chocolate was her favourite and now her domain. Soon Martha stopped eating not having as much of a portion as the two Kryptonians who had soon finished he'd the entire tub between them.

“Hungry?” Martha commented jokingly from the kitchen as she heard the spoons scrape the bottom of the tub

“It's been a long day” Clark replied he got up and popped Kara back onto the chair as he went into the kitchen to talk to his mother.

“So I really need to get back to the daily planet so I'm just going to say goodbye then head off”

Martha's eyes narrowed, “Goodbye to who” she asked knowing the answer but needing the confirmation to face off against her son

“Kara?” He trailed out slowly

“Does that mean you are leaving me with a Kryptonian teenager who knows nothing about this planet her powers and doesn't even speak english”

“Err yes?” Clark said wincing a little he knew his mother's tones

“No, clearly you cannot drop a teenager on me Kryptonian or not I can't just drop everything!”

Clark winced “But I can't take her I just started at the planet and you know superman duties as well..”

“No Clark Kent you do not get to make your inconveniences bigger than mine by calling the superman card” Martha hissed at him, “She family you said it yourself what's so bad about you dropping everything to help her?”

Clark thought about it a little but he couldn't stop his work he had just gotten a reputable position at the planet. There was one place though…

“Fine, sorry for assuming mum and thanks for your hospitality tonight and the lovely food” he gave her a hug as she huffed at him in mock annoyance

“Kara” Clark called out and held out his hand, “Time to go”

Kara looked to Kal X then ran to Clark and grabbed his hand speaking Kryptonian which Kal X translated hovering just behind her

“Mistress Kara would like to know where we are travelling”

“To my home” Clark replied, Martha smiled

“Bye Kara it was lovely to meet you” she waved as they headed for the door

Kara replied in Kryptonian and Kal x stayed to respond to Martha before flying off behind the Kryptonians.

Clark headed first to the top of the daily planet building to grab his bag of clothes eve fire swooping into his apartment through the balconies open window.

Placing Kara down on the sofa he quickly changed into regular clothes including the glasses.

Looking around his flat he saw the answer machine was flashing with multiple missed messages. Shit. Probably all from his boss secretary maybe one from Jimmy.

“Kal el?” A voice questioned from behind him. He turned to see Kara looked terrible Like something was affecting her head

Kara moaned and held her head Kal X hadn't arrived yet, Clark had decided not to keep slow to make sure it kept up so that superman wouldn't be seen. If his arms weren't full he would have grabbed him too but alas Kara was precious cargo.

She had her hands over her ears as though she was trying to keep sound out

“Loud is it loud?” Clark thought back to the first time in the city. It had been a little strange to be able to hear so much in so much noise and had taken him awhile to getting use to the change from the countryside and able to pinpoint areas to listen on, maybe this was happening here

“Kara Kara concentrate on my voice concentrate on me and no one else and let the other voices float away” he tried speaking softly but it seemed Kara couldn't hear him amongst the noise

He tried again louder trying to get through to her, “Kara please try to concentrate on my voice”

It was then that Kal X flew in through the window

“Kal X thank goodness I need your help her super hearing she can't focus and it's overwhelming her”

Kal X clicked into action and a song began to play from his speakers. Clark recognized it even though he had never heard it before as far as he knew but it calmed down Kara instantly as she was able to focus on the robot in front of her and her hands came away from her ears as she came out of the ball she had curled into and looked at the robot so lost.

Clark sighed and moved away to another part of his apartment what was he going to do with her. He couldn't help her in the way she needed if he wanted to continue his life as it was.   
Thinking back to where he had thought of earlier to take her . She would be safe from the evils of the earth but definitely not safe from the evils within, Maybe he could bargain with them. To get rid of the kryptonite and in exchange help him with Kara.

He would sleep on it for a few days, see how things went before he considered the DEO option.


	2. Chapter 2

The first few days of Kara staying with Clark went fairly smoothly. She was busy nearly all her waking hours learning english from Kal X so Clark was fine to vanish off to his work at the daily planet. He currently didn’t have a computer (Mr White had said if he wasn’t intelligent enough to notice that the keyboard and mouse were unplugged he wasn’t deserving of one) so he had to handwrite his articles and then borrow Jimmy’s.

 

Okay maybe saying smoothly was a bit of an overestimation, at least one day had been awkward when he had to go buy Kara some other clothes. Buying a ton of teenage girl clothes got him some weird looks. Okay lots of teenage girl clothes and one boys superman shirt.

 

He ended up having to buy more of those Kara really enjoyed clothes that included her house symbol.

 

If Clark was being completely honest the days were smooth the nights certainly weren’t. To the point that even Superman was beginning to show dark circles under his eyes. Kara suffered from intense nightmares that would wake near enough the whole building. Once he got Kara awake and calm he would then have to field complaints from the angry neighbours at his door for the next hour. Then it still would be another few hours before him and Kal X could convince Kara to go back to sleep.

 

The neighbours were understanding the first few nights as Clark would hastily explain how his cousin was staying with him due to her family recently passing away in a fire. It bought sympathy for awhile before the letter came about a week into Karas stay. It was a notice that he was violating his lease by having more than one permanent occupant in the household and that either had to change and proof be gained or he was to be evicted.

 

He was staring at the letter one evening pondering what on earth to do when Kara ran into the room chasing Kal X playing a small game of chase knocking his entire sofa / karas current bed flying causing him to have to quickly fly and save it from smashing through his large windows overlooking metropolis.

 

“Kara be careful!” He admonished  not really too annoyed at her but taking a little of the rage of his current situation out on her.

 

“Sorry Kal” she replied looking sheepish, “Play?” she asked with her limited knowledge of english she could just about handle a basic conversation without having to resort to kryptonian

 

Clark shook his head his gaze returning to the now extremely crumpled letter in his grip and Kara ran off into the only other room (Clarks bedroom) in his small apartment to track down Kal X.

 

Apartment hunting it was. His mind never even thought back to the DEO.

 

He managed to convince Perry White to give him the day off so he could find a new place. He hasn't told anyone at work about Kara yet and he had no plans to tell them at all. After all he was sure 12 year olds were meant to be in school and perhaps not left alone all day in a tiny one bedroom apartment.

 

He didn't tell Kara he was looking just that they would be moving. So soon everything would have to be packed away except the furniture this has been a pre furnished place. Something he was going to struggle to find on short notice.

 

He started looking through the copies of the advertisements that were due to go into tomorrow's paper he had swiped from the planet. Hoping to get a head start on the good places before they were swiped.

 

It wasn't turning out as well as Clark had presumed and he was getting further and further out from central Metropolis as he hunted for a two bedroom place that allowed children.

 

He turned up outside one of the second to last places. It was a last resort almost as it afforded privacy but at a cost.

 

The advertisement was for a small converted house. The basement was the one bedroom flat and upstairs was essentially a two bedroom house with a skylight affording lots of sun which was good and excellent for flying out of. It has Clarks vote just for that already, it was an excellent replacement for a handy balcony. It also had a garden attached. It was small but Clark was already thinking it would be good for Kara to have an outside space.

 

“The gentleman living in the basement keeps himself to himself” The estate agent was telling Clark as they walked along the block to the door. “Never been a bother to anyone despite the close knit sharing”

 

Clark looked confused as to the sharing before the agent opened up the main front door. It seemed there was no external access to the basement flat, so Clark would be sharing a communal hallway, stairs led down just into the house.

 

“The ground floor is essentially yours aside from this space” the agent began describing, “Your front door as it were is here” he indicated a door to the right,

 

This so far was different to apartment buildings with the shared communal hallway so that didn’t phase him,

Through the door was the living room it was a generous size and it led through to the kitchen at the back of the house with a sliding door access to the garden, the smaller bedroom was also attached to the living room and it had a large window which Clark was sure Kara would enjoy.

Through the kitchen was the stairs which led up to the larger bedroom and the bathroom, at the top of the stairs was the large angled skylight.

 

Clark was sold. He had spotted a few issues in that the basement flat had windows which could see into the garden but provided Kara was careful this seemed the perfect place to move to.

 

“This is a remarkably strange house” Clark commented to the letting agent as they headed to exit

 

“The owner just has never wanted to build it up, he seemed content converting the basement and moving in downstairs when the housing crisis got tough”

 

“So the owner lives downstairs” Clark asked surprised

 

“Yes but like I said he keeps himself to himself, we handle all the payments so don't worry about having to knock on his door or anything and I'm sure everything will be fine, even the most rousted of tenants we have given him haven't causing him by trouble!” the agent seemed to add ss an afterthought

 

Clark had pretty much decided, this place although a lot further from work than was probably ideal for a normal human but it offered a bit more privacy and it wasn’t like commuting was an issue, it was no Kent Farm but it was the best he could offer his cousin and he was rather excited for the future now.

 

“When can I move in?” Clark asked “My previous lease is coming to an end soon” he didn't want to say why to the agent, probably not the best plan.

 

“Well we have to check your references and you would have to come by our offices and sign some paperwork but if the references come back clear about two weeks?”

 

Clark nodded he could probably sort out a few days in a hotel if it was needed as his lease began ticking down to the end of the month

 

“Great here's my number” he hastily handed the estate agent his card

 

“Daily Planet? You know not to put you off but it's going to take you a mighty long time to get to work” he added putting the card away in his pocket

 

“It's okay it's worth it” Clark assured and with that they said their goodbyes with promises to come to their head office in Metropolis to give over references.

 

Clark waited a while outside admiring the little oddity house surrounded by tall buildings containing flats before heading off down the street to find a suitable spot to fly home from.

 

\----

 

Kara had even doing well with her education and was progressing fast even though often if she wasn't concentrating she would slip back into Kryptonian. TV was helping Clark had flipped through the channels and found a learning channel aimed at kids learning to talk

 

It was extremely babyish but that was perhaps the best way to start her off. Kal X was good for providing translations for objects around the house and nights had started to go a little smoother since he had moved the sofa into his room and had taken to learning Kryptonian with Kara until she fell asleep from exhaustion. Plus when she did wake up with a nightmare Clark was not far away to provide comfort and ask Kal X to play various songs to help sloth her panicked screams.

 

He lost his security deposit though one night. Thankfully after the references had come back okay for the new place. Kara in a panic had shot out of bed toward Clark at full superspeed resulting in him having to grab the nearest thing to keep from flying into the wall. That thing had been his bed post.

 

Both the bed and the floor was damaged in the violent movement . Kara had never accessed her powers in dreams before and in this case it seemed she was indeed sleepwalking as she wasn't screaming and her grip which would kill any mortal around was squishing Clarks ribs as she hugged him tight.

 

This was a worrying and new development. Maybe gettin her out the apartment tomorrow would be a good idea to go see the new place. Kara could fly if she liked and get some time out the flat.

 

It was decided, tomorrow was one of his rota’d days off after all.

 

In the Morning Kara got up and dressed nonplussed she had woken up in Clark's arms again after a bad night. She did wonder slightly about the bed damage but didn't mention it to either of the flat occupants.

 

Having dressed washed and brush her teeth as Clark had shown her with human tools she shuffled over to the kitchen counter area for breakfast.

 

“Pan cakes?” she asked seeing Clark at the kitchen counter making breakfast in his Pajamas as Kara had been using the only bathroom.

 

“The very same… I mean yes” Clark ended on and nodded he was a little too asleep to remember to use short phrases and head and hand movements so Kara would understand without Kal X around.

 

Kara did a little hop of joy and without meaning too floated into the air and bobbed a little on the ceiling like a balloon.

 

Clark bit his lip from laughing but seeing as Kara was distressed he floated up himself and guided her down.   
  


“Doh!” Kara supplied

 

“You've clearly been watching too much tv” Clark commented as he sat her down at the kitchen island.

 

“We're going to visit the new place today” Clark told Kara

 

She slightly nodded before flicking her eyes to Kal X to check her translation was okay

 

“Outside?” Kara asked beaming with a broad smile

 

“Yeah outside, so best behaviour and sadly no Kal X” Clark added realising communication might become an issue.

 

Kara frowned but nodded still excited about being able to finally go outside and expend the energy she had built up being stuck in a small apartment for a few weeks.

 

They finished up pancakes and Clark used his superspeed to tidy up and wash the dirty dishes.

 

“Right let me get dressed and then we can head out!” Clark said heading to the bathroom he saw Kara grab Kal X and talk to it in a long string of Kryptonian.

 

He didn't take too long to get dressed but longer than it would have been had he used his super speed. He preferred to do it at normal speed but today he combined super speeding through a shower but normal pace for brushing his teeth and dressing.

 

Once being late for work he had superspeed his trousers on and ripped every seam as they accidentally came over his head as he pulled too hard. Some stuff you can do fast dressing was one of them but only with great care. I mean enough of his salary already went on replacement shirts from when he went from Clark to Superman.

 

Now all ready and prepared he went to go put his lead lined glasses on and paused.

 

He could control his X Ray vision, Kara couldn't yet did she even have it yet? Clark tried to think when he gained his X Ray vision as he quickly searched through his closet for his old school things.

 

He had been a teen and thankfully yes here they are. His teenage lead glasses his dad had made him. He held onto them for a little while missing his dad before standing up.

 

“Kal X?” He called “Could you translate this for me?”

 

Kal X zoomed over and Kara followed Clark caught the sight of a map winking off Kal X’s screen before it turned blank ready for Clark to speak.

 

“These are for you Kara” Clark held out the glasses, “They are lead lined so your X Ray vision is repressed so you can just focus on seeing how normal humans see, it's possible you haven't developed the ability yet I got it pretty late myself but just incase”

 

He paused as Kara took the glasses, “Don't let anyone else touch them as they are about 10 times heavier than normal glasses…” He took a deep breathe “Also please don't break them my … Adoptive father made these and they mean a lot”

 

Kara smiled and copied Clark as he put his own glasses on she wiggled her nose a lot as they settled in place but she accepted them

 

“Thank you” she said and she flew up and grabbed Clark in a grip that would crush a humans ribs

 

They stayed hugging for awhile before Kara released him.

 

“Okay copy me and if you have any problems where we need to go home fast stomp on my foot, okay?”

 

Kara nodded then stomped on his foot and Clark winced as a mini earthquake went through the apartment.

 

“Yeah like that's” he nodded and then they both said goodbye to Kal X and headed out into earth.

 

Kara acted just like Clark holding his hand as they walked out onto the street. He didn't know where to take her first any human teenager would be obsessed with shopping and be in the mall but he was quite glad Kara wasn't.*

 

He kept having to hold Kara back to investigate the seagulls and the pigeons. So she watched fascinated from a distance. They got some odd looks probably because Kara does seem too old to want to hold his hand or maybe some really creepy folk had some dark thoughts.

 

After walking a few streets Clark stopped in the Park sitting calmly on the grass as Kara ran around after the birds staring up at them joy written all over her face.

 

She didn't stray too far so Clark had chance to relax a bit while Kara expelled her energy. Making sure she kept her feet on the ground Kara seemed to be enjoying herself before suddenly possibly using a little super speed she was next to him leaning against his arm looking a little wary.

 

Clark looked over to where she had been playing about and saw a strange figure in a large coat. He looked odd but what was fed finery odd was the continued staring at both him and Kara in fact he didn't seem to be blinking.

 

Kara hasn't stopped on his foot though so she didn't want to head home but Clark definitely wanted to head away from that creep.

 

Standing up Kara practically glued to his side they headed away from the staring unblinking coat wearer. Reaching the edge of the park Clark spotted an empty alley and headed down it before grabbing Kara and flying off.

 

Heading to the new place they were due to move into he landed in the secluded place he found before and took off from a week prior.

 

Putting Kara back on her feet she now looked a lot calmer and smiled up at Clark seemingly relieved to be now far away from creepy stalker.

 

“Going to the new place” Clark explained and Kara looked a little confused

 

“New place?” She repeated

 

“Home, new home” Clark corrected knowing she knew that word

 

Karas face changed completely as she understood and hopped forwards and grabbed Clarks hand again.

 

They walked a few blocks before they reached the oddly shaped house.

 

Clark pointed it out to Kara and tried to explain how it was laid out but with the language barrier it was a little hard. So they settled to just walking up to the outside to look at the front a bit ad Kara tried to ask a question.

 

“My Room?” … “One?” She pointed at herself

 

“Yes Room for you” Clark replied poking Kara and she grinned happily and nearly floated up to give him a hug but Clark put a hand on her shoulder quickly to stop her and thus ended up in a hug around his midsection.

 

It was at that point when a man stepped out the house. He was dressed in a large hoodie and ill fitting trousers.

 

Kara looked supposed but Clark reassured her with a smile and her face relaxed a little.

 

Clarks new neighbour looked up to check the street for traffic and spotted them. He seemed surprised that they were standing there and almost triple took as he continued across the street away from them.

 

Clark supposed they looked a bit odd standing outside his house but not for three takes at them. Maybe he had seen his picture on one of the references or something, perhaps he should have introduced himself… Too late now.

 

Seeing as the resident of the house was out Clark could at least show Kara the back garden.

 

There was a gate to the side which wasn't locked at the moment so they both walked through into the enclosed space with grass. Kara had a look through the windows at the lower floor of their new place and seemed excited.

 

Not staying long in case the downstairs neighbour wasn't planning on being out long they look off from the back garden as it was well enclosed and Clark could go fast enough to miss human eyes catching him flying up.

 

It was about lunchtime so Clark headed back to central metropolis and they headed into a fast food place where they could grab Karas new found favourite food that was one of her first words learnt in English. It was easier for her learning new words for food than it was translating from the Kryptonian equivalent.

 

Clark bought a lot more that what would normally be bought for two people of their size but aside from a raised eyebrow the customer service agent didn't say a word.

 

Opting to eat outside the fast food place as they were about to put away some serious food they headed back to the park that wasn't far away sitting on the grass again they very quickly destroyed the food between them. Kara keeping up with Clark bite for bite with her own food seeming extremely happy to be outside and Clark felt a little guilty for keeping her in the apartment since she had arrived on earth.

 

After eating Kara enjoyed her milkshake and lay down on the grass looking up at the sky. After he was finished Clark joined her and they were there a while before Clark felt someone watching them

 

It was that man again, staring from a distance away. Kara noticing Clark stiffened posture she sat up too followed his eye line and then the next thing Clark knew his left foot was about 30cm into the grass.

 

Moving into action he stood up grabbed the trash with one hand and Kara with the other and walked briskly away. He didn't use his powers in such an open space but he couldn't feel any weight holding his hand and a quick glance down confirmed Kara might be moving her feet like she was walking but they actually were off the floor and she was floating in her anxiety to get away from the rather creepy man.

 

Putting the trash in the bin at the edge of the park he quickly turned to see if they were being followed. They were. What the hell.

 

Moving even faster Kara began to struggle to keep up so Clark took the fast route and dived into a crowd just getting off the subway and melted into them before side stepping into an alley and whisking him and Kara away home.

 

Once inside the flat Kara began speaking in rapid Kryptonian Kal X appeared from inside Clarks bedroom and listened.

 

“Mistress Kara is highly distressed what happened?” Kal X asked Clark still rapidly running Kryptonian through his new translation system

 

Clark shrugged and Kara finished her tirade before turning and closing every curtain and then hovered near the ceiling where it was dark

 

“Mistress Kara recognised that the man watching them was an alien, more specifically one her mother had previously put in jail…” Kal X paused a moment as he must have searched his database for the name and brought up a face “He was imprisoned in Fort Rozz a year before your birth Master Kal serving a life sentence”

 

“Mistress Kara said that she recognised his race the first time she spotted him but she recognised his face the second time”

 

“What did he do?” Clark asked, “A life sentence… Actually I guess the more pressing question is how is he here?”

 

Kal X lowered his volume, “He kidnapped and ate children”

 

Well that explained Karas current reaction

 

“As for his location on earth that is unknown, Fort Rozz is located in the Phantom Zone where time doesn't pass”

 

“.... Time doesn't pass, where Kara was?”

 

“Yes master Kal”

 

“So something must have happened in the phantom zone if two people from there are now here on earth, maybe they followed Karas pod?”

 

Kal X unable to shake his head was forced to interrupt Clark “No, that particular species are not space faring they would have also had to be in a pod but Fort Rozz doesn't have any pods, they used internal teleporters to move the prisoners off world”

 

Clark looked up at Kara who hadn't moved from the dark corner of the ceiling

 

“How does Kara know him?” Clark asked

 

“Mistress Kara often used to read her Mother's files, she was … The earth's equivalent of a judge on Krypton”

 

Clark tilted his head he should have remembered that but honestly hadn't thought much about Karas mother beyond the fact she has a mother

 

“So Fort Roz escapee followed Kara or just came across Kara?” Clark wondered

 

“Considering how many days you have been indoors I assume it was a random chance”

 

Clark exhaled, maybe until he caught that escapee Kara should definitely not be allowed out alone.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Kara refused to let him open the blinds for the rest of the day. Clark went out as superman to see if he could find the escapee but he was unlucky with his search.

Back to work he had to leave Kara again during the day he had not even a slight fear she would try to sneak out and investigate the outside world.

He had to ask for time off to move. His boss was initially really annoyed until he said he really only needed half a day as he didn’t own much (a massive lie he could move in an hour but he wanted at least a few hours at the new place with Kara) 

He got the half day in the afternoon later that week. he nipped over to the office at lunch to finalise the paperwork and all was clear. 

After he got back from lunch Jimmy cornered him 

“Okay at first I thought you were just stressed over the extra work but there's something else up, you've never even had a sick day and all of a sudden you’re having time off and actually taking our days off?” Jimmy looked him in the eyes blocking his path to the lifts 

“Also you look like you're getting barely any sleep if I didn't know you any better I would say you've found a girl! ” he commented in aware how close he was to the truth in that statement now he was close up to Clarks face he could see the dark circles under his eyes and the tiredness behind his eyes as well

Clark signed and bent his head to rub his forehead and decided to give Jimmy an abridged version 

“My cousin, my biological cousin her family just died in a house fire and I'm her only living relative so she moved in with me and she's going to stay with me she's only thirteen and” he guest urged to his eyes “She has nightmares about the fire still so I don't get much sleep” 

Jimmy looked upset and rather sorry he asked, “Not what I was expecting from you as an explanations go but …” He trailed off 

“Why take her in I mean” he gestured around the office “You have a big job and a tiny apartment” 

“We're moving” Clark said but he frowned at the implication he shouldn’t be looking after her, “and why wouldn't I take her in?”

Jimmy looked confused, “Just because someone is family doesn't mean you have to look after then if you don't want to”

Clark stiffened and snapped a little, “But I DO want to Jimmy, she's my only living relative! I was adopted as a baby I've never known my family and Kara she can tell me things about them I never knew”

Okay that explains it rather well too.This conversation would be going a whole lot better if he could actually say ‘were the only survivors of an alien world’ but hey this was close enough 

“And she lost her family too I can't do that to her again, just pawn her off to some family she doesn't know?” 

Jimmy shifted uncomfortably under Clark's gaze “Well the agency's are pretty good at….” 

Clark raised an eyebrow “As reporters you damn well know they are not” 

Jimmy sighed, “I'm sorry man I was just worried about you” 

Clark supposed he could understand that, “That's fine just, my family my decision”

James nodded, “How are things going there then, aside from the nightmares?” 

Clark smiled, “Great, she's learning English pretty fast - sadly though TV but soon she'll have it”

“English?” Jimmy questioned, “where was she from?” 

Clark had really put his foot in it now but the well had burst and he felt he had to talk to someone about it and Kal X wasn't much of a conversationalist. His mother was also suspiciously dodging his calls.

“Swedish” Clark decided on a whim.

 

Jimmy nodded, “I guess the language barrier plus nightmares is the reason I had to correct multiple dumb spelling mistakes when I was reviewing a few of your articles on my PC, speaking off when on earth are they getting a computer back?” He mildly complained 

“What's wrong, tired of my face already?” Clark joked and Jimmy chuckled at him and finally walked away shaking his head at Clark’s terrible sense of humour 

Lucky Clark had been only on his way to the bathroom this time and not a superman mission or that would have been a very awkward conversation 

\--

Moving evening went incredibly smoothly. Clark fixing the broken parts of the apartment as best he could with some D.I.Y stuff he got from the local store. 

He took all the boxes and other things and quickly zipped them over leaving only two large boxes he would ‘carry’ and a large bag for Kara just to make things look human 

They took the subway then a train and then walked a good few blocks to the house. Considering the weight they were both holding a human would have been unable to complete that task but they did and Clark was proud that Kara did as good of a job as him as making it all look human

When thus arrived at the new place the estate agent was waiting to give them the keys and their copies of all the documents. He peered curiously at Kara in her Superman T-shirt but didn’t say anything, just wished them a happy moving day and moved on to the next house. 

When they got through the main front door Clark had to call Kara to follow him as she was rather distracted with the stairs.

“Kara” he called over to her “Don't eavesdrop” he added to her

It was a new habit she had developed with her super hearing how she had a better understand long of English. It was helping her with her learning though the stuff she was repeating from the flat upstairs at their old apartment was it something a thirteen year old shouldn’t be saying but Clark now knew the rule of teens don't mention that which is not meant to be said as it will always be repeated.

He wished he knew that before he told Kara off for repeating the word for a female dog that one time she hadn't stopped saying it now.

Opening the next door they piled into their pre furnished flat that they now could make their own with their stuff.. Well Clarks stuff and some clothes of Karas and Kal X who was making his own way when it was dark.

They put their bags down by the door and Clark showed Kara round 

“Okay so downstairs is the living room kitchen and your room!” Clark told Kara showing her the room he had picked for her, it was suppose to be an office or a dining room but it was nicely delegated from the rest of the downstairs.

 

Upstairs is the bathroom and my room Clark added “And downstairs is our neighbour who owns this place and he lives in the converted basement which was the door on the left as we came in”

Kara nodded like she understood but Clark would probably repeat it later when Kal X was around just incase.

So we can decorate your room however you like “ Clark started, “I mean right now you just have clothes but you can get anything you want to make this space your own, I mean what kind of things did you have back on krypton that we might be able to into here?”

Kara paused looking about her room which had just a single bed a wardrobe and a desk in the corner with a chair that looked like it had been stolen from a school.

Kara still stayed silent so Clark tried to fill in the silence “Maybe stuff for school? I mean do you want to go to earth school at some point?” 

“School” Kara repeated and smiled, “I can't wait” Kara replied back to the Kryptonian 

He grinned, “Excited to learn about birds really aren't you” he joked and Kara looked down and smiled 

“Maybe some books and a bookshelf to go with it?” Clark tried he desperately wanted Kara to have her own space 

“Yes” she responded grinning “Good” she added in between Kryptonian language not knowing the translation.

“We can go out to get books the next day I have off then” Clark added, “But for now let's investigate the local takeaways or do you want to go for groceries?” 

“Pot stickers?” Kara asked

“Okay pot stickers it is but after that I probably should teach you some kitchen skills other than microwave heating and how to make a sandwich” Clark added but Kara didn't seem to be interested after pot stickers had been confirmed as a happening as she wondered

She stood at the bottom of the stairs which was right In front of their indoor front door and looked up and then flew up to investigate Clarks room and the bathroom.

Clark heard something strange from his room and he caught Kara on the way back down holding a photo frame 

“Kara?” Clark questioned pointing to the picture she had taken off his wall. 

Kara didn't seem to think she had done anything wrong so she turned it around to show him.  
It was one of his “baby” pictures. When he had crash landed on the Kent farm Martha had an old disposable camera and had taken a photo of him wrapped in his embossed baby blanket. 

Clark grinned at it and waved her onto her room where she proudly hung it up on her own wall above her desk.

He supposed it reminded her of home. 

It was a shame he didn't have any decorations or anything he could give her for her room. His pod had just contained him and Kal X. 

Maybe Karas pod had things in it too. Clark resolved to check back on her crashed pod for items later on. 

They ate in their new living room, Kara picked the show - Clark wasn’t sure what it was about or why Kara picked it but she was engrossed anyway. Subtitles were on and occasionally she would repeat phrases back to the TV.

Soon it was time to get some rest so Kara happily skipped off to her own room and Clark stayed in the living room next door for awhile. He wanted to make sure Kara was asleep and then hopefully during a small excursion out the house he could quickly get the pod he had stashed away underground where it had landed and bring it back the fortress to check it for items Kara could perhaps display in her room. 

When she went to earth school thought and wanted to bring friends back she would definitely have to hide all the alien stuff. He had become such a pro at it I suppose for Kara there was no taste of home where she lived.

He really needed a plan Clark did. He was just floating at the moment concentrating on Kara learning english so she could go to school… but then what? She wouldn’t know anything! She would be able to read and write in english, but understand what to do in a classroom or how to control her powers so that during PE she doesn’t break a wall?

It was overwhelming. Perhaps he should try and take a leave of absence from work for awhile. Just to get Kara… ready for earth and also maybe something to help her nightmares.. Ooh god it was a lot to worry about.

At least during his internal woes Kara had fallen asleep and listening to her breathing and X ray vision through the wall told him it was soundly and she was not currently in the throes of a nightmare.

Deciding to give himself just an hour he set a timer on his watch. Donned the superman outfit in his room and flew out of the skylight.

Man that was handier than a balcony. 

It wasn’t too far away in flight time but Clark decided to take it in lower altitude as it was night and he didn’t want to encounter any planes he couldn’t see. 

He arrived at the right location he could see parts of the debris that had flaked off upon landing and a large hole where he had forced it further into the ground that was clearly empty.

Damn maybe he should have come sooner. 

Vehicle tracks led away from the site and Clark figured he could follow them to maybe see where they might of gone. In fact if he could still see them they might have only been really recently. 

He spotted a sign as he flew up to where the tracks connected to a road ‘Welcome to Central City’ it read. Figuring the tracks had been lost now they had joined the road he was giving it up as a bad job when he noticed the tracks just went directly across the road. 

Hmm worth a look he followed them deeper outside the city the lights fading into the distance as he flew. 

Where the tracks stopped there wasn’t much of an indication on anything actually being there. Flying down the tracks seemed to just end at a little shack where the trucks must be parked inside. 

Odd

He got closer walking inside the shack where he discovered it was a deep long tunnel down underground. 

Okay this was weird. The government had covert operations but this deep in the middle of nowhere stealing alien tech deserved a little superman investigation.

Flying up and sneaking along the ceiling of the tunnel a trick he had learnt for avoiding security cameras he flew deep into the base.

The technology inside was nothing he had seen before outside lex luthors computer base of operations. It was immense. Workers everywhere despite the hour. Thankfully none of them looking up.

Scoping the base it looked like they were very well kitted out, amoury, a lab, more computers than people and what he was looking for. Karas pod.

It was being picked to pieces by the busy bee workers. So he couldn’t really do anything to sneak it out of there.

Wondering over in the air to what seemed the commander. His eyes caught what was on the screen. It was flicking through a roster of images but for a moment Clark could have sworn he saw the face of the alien Kara had said was staring at them a few days ago. Clark read the text on the screen next to it which ‘Fort Rozz Database Possible Escapees’

Was this the main DEO base he wondered. Clark turned to perhaps eavesdrop on a few people when the worst possible thing he never assumed would happen and give him away happened.

His watch went off, marking that he had been away an hour. In seconds he heard the sound of about 17 guns aimed at his position.

“I wouldn’t” he called out “You know it doesn’t work”

\------------------------

As Clark was away trying to improve Karas bedroom for her and generally being a really awesome lost guy just trying to figure out how to raise his alien cousin. Kara was trapped in a nightmare. 

It was the same nightmare it always was. It was hard to explain to Kal and Kal X how bad it was when she had woken up because she could rationalize it when she was awake. But when it was happening all around her again it was as real and as painful as the first time it happened. 

Her planet exploding not even a minute after she left with no pods following her and only a wink of her cousins pod in the distance the only other person of her race on the planet she watched vanish from her eyesight as the blast from the destruction of her world overpowered her engines and she was blasted in the opposite direction into the phantom zone. Where she was consumed by never ending darkness. 

She wasn’t of course awake during her time in the phantom zone. With no shielding she fell slowly into a deep sleep, and when leaving she awoke slowly from the same sleep. 

Although when she first awoke she had no idea as to the time passing, now every time she hit that deep part of her sleep it triggers her worst nightmare from beginning to end. 

Tonight wasn’t necessarily worse than any other night but tonight there was no one here to bring her out of it. Kal X floated by attempting to jar her out of it was Kryptonian music he had on file.

That was when a wave of calm suddenly flowed through her, Kal X noticed the physical changes in Kara almost instantly. She stopped writing around and her screaming calmed down to a small moan then silence as she began to sleep soundly. 

Kal X noted this experience as very odd but continued to keep watch on Mistress Kara.

\-------------------

In the basement flat below a man was seated staring at the ceiling 

At first when his new tenants had moved in he assumed his powers were perhaps weakened by the weather but the more he tried the more he could not read their minds. They were a wall not letting him in.

It was intriguing.

That was until the younger, the teenager had gone to sleep. Asleep he couldn’t read her mind but she was having such violent dreams and trying to push them away she was pushing them right out of her blockade allowing him to watch and read through them like a book.

What he saw was horrifying and so much like what he had experienced himself it took him awhile to get back to himself and send a wave of calm over the girl until she stopped projecting her nightmare and fell into normal sleep.

His own planet had burned. It hadn’t exploded but it might as well have. Those memories brought back so much…..

What irony it was that two alien refugees were renting from another alien refugee. Chances of that happening.. 

He wasn’t about to reveal himself to them though no. This was how he stayed safe. Low profile living off the money he got from rent just enjoying his time being alive on earth in the basement where he could practise his shapeshifting and other powers without any chance of anyone seeing him.

It was also much warmer as it was so insulated allowing him to emulate the Mars atmosphere on earth. He was currently just lounging on his chair as an earth creature he enjoyed to be in the shape of just because it was so comfortable. A little fat guinea pig. 

It might be a green guinea pig but in the dark of his basement who could tell. 

He had come into the land which the house stood on accidentally. Living on earth a long long time meant that stuff that 100 years ago meant nothing now meant something. So he had built the perfect little house and then just moved into the basement, With the government questioning anything and everything he now could show he was a landowner living off rent. 

They were also so stupid. He had become quite adept in showing his ID to them in his hand merely shapeshifting one of his fingers into it. No one had ever seemed to take it off him to check. 

His name was J'onn J'onzz and he was the last survivor of Mars. What a survivor he was as well, Lasting nearly 200 years on earth. 

Not that those 200 years were easy but his continued efforts of keeping to the shadows had worked. He had only encountered resistance when he attempted to help people when society had started to come together like it had now. 

He liked his basement. But he had been here a long time. But it worked. He had finally found something that had worked for him, 

I mean it had taken some planning to sort out something that would work, I mean at first 200 years ago no one asked many questions and at times he found it far easier to live life as a dog for a couple of his ten years. Sadly having to run off from the kind families that cared for him after a certain amount of years or they would wonder how they had an ageless dog.

He found he could get anywhere as an animal but only provided if he met a friendly human, the bad humans once he had interacted with when he was a dog. Forcing him to fight. He had shape shifted out of that situation so fast when he realised what was going down.

\--- 

But the conundrum now was what to do about the other refugees upstairs. They clearly were trying to stay below the radar. The check he had on them as tenants was pretty extensive thanks to the estate agent and he knew the adult was one Clark Kent a reporter at the daily planet in main metropolis and a relation unknown was the teenager that was just named Kara Kent on his papers and no other information due to her age.

He supposed she was the one projecting her nightmares. No wonder they had been kicked out of their last appartement not only would her loud screaming know no bounds but her projection onto them of her nightmare would have caused them too to have similar dreams and issues. All very understandable now at first J’onn thought he was just getting another unruly teenager with a tendency to play loud music late at night. 

That was nicely not the case. Jon swept the apartment again and could feel no presence of minds upstairs just the peripheral of the girls mind as she continued to sleep soundly after the calm waves he had sent earlier. 

Perhaps he would interact more with these tenants or at least at a face to face value. He often got to know his tenants very well normally steering them to make wise life decisions, it was the reason he didn’t mind taking problem tenants they had to pay more due to their pasts and they never did anything to his house because he would be there making sure they decided that no having a housewarming party at 12 am was not a wise choice and maybe a dinner party would be nicer and you would get to practise those cooking skills you have been wanting to try when you were a child.

J’onn supposed in a way he was the bad guy. He could easily be on this planet and if he revealed himself and his true shape he was sure to be shunned.

He currently didn’t have a shape he stuck with, there wasn’t any need when he was in his apartment a lot changing shapes he never thought of one human face to emulate but he supposed if he were to be friend the tenants upstairs he should maybe look like them a little in appearance.

Moving to the only mirror in his house the small one in the bathroom he switched on the light and moved in front of it. His basic martian form looked back at him, his long green head and large eyes. Closing his eyes he moved into what he had always imagined himself as superhero would look like opening his eyes to his human shaped head and his uniform crossing over with a big X and a cape fluttering down to his ankles. 

Closing his eyes again he imagined this shape but as a human he opened his to find his short brown hair over dark skin with bright brown eyes and a bright green garish shirt.

Urgh he thought internally that's what not concentrating enough will get you and in the next blink his clothes were black. 

Much better. 

He resolved himself to stay in this shape and then went to his TV to tune into the evening news as he did every night to keep himself apprised as to the goings on in the world. People might not want his help here but if a storm was on its way he always wanted to be prepared to save people as “superman” since the caped crusader had revealed himself to the world he could easily shape shift into superman and people would near enough fall at his feet for him to save them as opposed to his green form.

\----

Meanwhile at the DEO 

Everything should have been chaos. 99% of the time when Superman appeared it was either because there was currently chaos in progress or he was about to cause the chaos as he was mobbed by the public.

It was an accident the first and only time It happened, he was distracted after rescuing people from a building fire and he had forgotten to get re-dressed before heading to get coffee.

The coffee shop had renamed itself and everything. Milking his dumb blunder for every grain of coffee they could sell. Clark had ruined his favourite coffee by accident. Now he just dealt with homebrew and a really robust mug for when he had to practically boil it for minutes on end with his heat vision to get it to taste even nearly the same.

But back to the present, and the really eerie calm.

“Superman” called a commanding voice from below, “Nice of you to drop in” the comment was filled with sarcasm but his upbringing was too nice for him to respond in any way but kindness I mean they hadn’t shot him yet

“My pleasure, but If I might ask where exactly this is I have dropped into?” He floated down and addressed the leader who was talking to him. 

The leader regarded him with a certain amount of disdain “You are lucky you are protected by that S on your chest”

Clark narrowed his eyes, “It’s actually the symbol of my family house”

The leader raised an eyebrow, “You shouldn’t give away your secrets so easily, Alien” 

“It’s on my chest, I’m pretty loud and proud about how it’s the symbol of my family” Clark replied, “What is this place” he repeated not really liking this ‘Alien’ term used as a derogatory.

“Question for a question, five each?” Countered the leader 

Clark narrowed his eyes, “Fine, but lower the guns you know they don’t work and they’re just endangering your other men”

The leader tilted his head back before dismissing the other men with just a movement of his hand

“Me first” the leader started giving Clark no room to argue, “Who landed on this planet six weeks ago?” 

“A member of my family” Clark replied not giving any more information than he needed too

“What is this place?” Clark fired back before the leader could argue his answer wasn’t satisfactory

“DEO, department of extranormal operations”

“I thought so but-” The leader cut him off with his next question.

“Krypton exploded over 20 years ago, how did another one of your race survive?”

Clark nearly spoke as though to a friend and had to think to phrase his answer so that he didn’t give more away than he needed too, 

“Trapped in the phantom zone, it’s a place where time doesn’t pass” Clark answered avoiding ‘she’ and names

“I know what the phantom zone is” Came the sharp reply

Clark made a face but continued, “Did you find anything else in the escape pod?” he asked

At this the leader made a face “So that’s how you found us, No, How did they escape?” 

Clark shrugged, “No idea”

The leader openly reacted to that response, “Typical” he also muttered 

“What’s typical?” Clark asked momentarily forgetting he only had a set number of questions he could ask 

“That you aliens just don’t think of the repercussions of your actions, always messing up our planet in the process”

“What…” Clark managed before the leader angrily mashed at the screen bringing up a recording 

“They brought Fort Rozz with them. Straight out of the phantom zone and landing smack in our desert” He shot Clark a dark look, “Too busy to help with that landing or even make a smidgen of an appearance as hundreds of alien prisoners escaped”

Okay now Clark didn’t have anything to say and just had a large urge to go back to where Kara was and make sure she was okay. 

“What nothing to say?” the leader turned and now was very much in Clark’s face it was quite intimidating and reminded him a lot of his boss at the daily planet but he fought to keep his Superman persona in place and not let Clark out

“I had no idea” he answered honestly, “If I had known I would have helped but this at least explains why I saw one of the prisoners last week in the center of metropolis” 

“We had to cover it up… a crash of that size luckily the shield held that keeps it invisible or we would have mass planetary hysteria” he spat in Clark's face

Clark snapped a little “There was no way of knowing these set of events. My cousin had no part or even way of causing these events”

“And yet they happened” He spat

“I was a baby when I arrived here, I caused a large forest fire, was that my fault?” Clark countered

The leader stepped back a little regarding Clark, “So it is another baby Kryptonian, Interesting”   
Clark did NOT like the way this guy said interesting

“Look I just came here to see if the pod contained anything else but I am happy to help catch escapees and bring them to you”

“I would just as rather lock you up with them” the leader grumbled but not to Clarks face

“Fine don’t accept my help but every so often when I find one i’m bringing it to you” .. “Captured I might add much as i would rather let them loose” Clark added throwing the leader's words back against him

He huffed but kept his back turned 

Clark quickly did an X-ray sweep for anything kryptonian but he found nothing so empty handed but not with an empty mind he flew away from the DEO as fast as he could. He had such an urge to be near and protect Kara at the moment he felt like a mother hen. 

When he got home through back through the new skylight all was calm. Sneaking down he grabbed Kal X from where it had been ‘sleeping’ in the corner 

“Master Kal, How can I assist” the robot asked as Clark dragged him into the kitchen to prevent waking Kara

“Has Kara slept okay so far?” he asked worriedly pulling off his superman suit as he talked 

“There was some discomfort but it did not last longer than thirty seconds before she calmed down again”

“No screaming or thrashing?” 

“No Master Kal”

“Oh that’s… wow that’s good maybe moving did help”

“It is perhaps to early to draw that conclusion Master Kal”

“Yes perhaps” He replied

“Would you like me to take the Superman Suit?” Kal X asked holding out his long robotic pincer arms, “It really looks like it needs washing”

“Yes well… Its a superman suit its not something you can take in a laundry room” Clark replied 

Kal X just ignored him and whizzed off upstairs probably to condemn Clark on the rest of his clothes for the cleanliness 

He stood in his pants in the kitchen for awhile letting the moonlight streaming through the large window hit him. It wasn’t as refreshing as sunlight as it was only a reflection of its power but it helped. 

Stretching up he headed upstairs for bed un aware as to what he had done to his downstairs neighbour


	4. Chapter 4

Superman

Friggin Superman 

Superman the hero of Planet Earth was renting off him and living upstairs.

Good job he wasn’t the type to seem star struck but of all the alien fugitives on the planet and he got the one who was proud to show himself and use the powers he gained from being here to help others.

And he moved into THIS house.

Fate was clearly playing with him. 

\---

Somewhere in the astral plane. Dr Fate chuckled. 

\---

Things began to smooth out after the move. With both Clark and Kara getting to sleep through the night they both became healthier and a lot less paranoid. But Clark still didn’t allow Kara outside unless he went with her, which meant every errand that normally took him less than 15 minutes took a whole hour. Especially grocery shopping. 

It was a usual Monday. Clark had gotten up early and had zoomed about getting the house ready for him to leave it. Making many sandwiches for him and Kara and leaving it out for her on the side. This was so she could eat and not have to use any utensil he hadn’t taught her yet and at least keep her diet vaguely okay, okay it made him feel better but really the more calories the better for them on this planet.

Hence the chocolate spread sandwiches and peanut butter and jelly. Human advertising and healthy living forced down his throat meant he felt guilty for every burger somehow. 

Hopefully that marketing would never affect Kara too much. The adverts on the kids channel though were not so damaging.

Having made Kara and himself food and set the dishwasher to clean dishes and the washing machine that had washed clothes overnight set to dry there wasn’t much left to do except wake Kara up. Which he enjoyed because for nearly a month and a half she had awoken him from all kinds of sleep

Knocking on her door softly then slowly louder he heard a groan from inside “Time to get up!”

He turned and headed back to the kitchen to organise his briefcase then wandered back with them in hand to witness Kara slowly floating herself duvet blanket and all to the sofa. 

“Thats’... so much cheating” Clark commented but far too amused to hate on Kara

He moved into her eyeline. “Please work today?” he asked and motioned to the work books on the coffee table in front of him so that Kara could understand his meaning

“Yes Kal” Kara responded in a sleepy moan

Happy she was vaguely awake at least and had found an amusing way to skip his “On the sofa at least before I leave for work” rule

He used superspeed to get to work from there. Zooming straight into a nearby street to the subway exit he would use if he was a human and he walked to work from there. In case anyone might wonder why they never saw him on the way into work he always made the effort to at least human walk the few blocks to the daily planet. 

At home Kara waited a few minutes and then flew up off the sofa, she had been getting bored and had been planning on doing some stuff in the garden she had read about in one of her many books. 

She had never interacted much with the natural element which made up her planet. She had to keep to the main city plaza which was all raised up and away from the ground. Like a giant building that you could never leave. Kara had loved it during her time there but with the option here to explore the garden she had asked for a few books so she could find out what to do with it. She had been ignoring her work books and english lessons as she got Kal X to read the books to her but the pictures she saw were fascinating and one of the books she had came with seeds.

And Kara wanted flowers as she had seen in many of the tv shows on this planet flowers were a traditional earth gift and she wanted to give Clark some for being such a good cousin and looking after her and caring about her learning. Despite having to leave nearly every day… and night. But Kara didn’t need him in the night so much anymore so the Superman jaunts she didn’t miss but very much enjoyed watching them on morning television. 

Kal X had’t told her Clark had been out last night so she was straight onto the garden. And Flower growing. 

Selecting a patch of ground Kara dug with her hands making a 15cm deep hole. Using a ruler Clark had gotten her she looked for the numbered symbols that matched what was written in the book. She could understand parts of the book and was annoyed Kal X couldn’t come outside with her to read it to her to make sure she wasn’t doing anything wrong. After spending a good few hours like that she went inside to finish the workbooks. 

It didn’t take her long to finish those and it was still many hours before Kal El would be home.   
Having tired of daytime television she could barely understand and not in the mood to try reading her other books with Kal X switched off for the day (To encourage her to work herself and not cheat by asking him all the questions)

Kara booted up the PC. It was a difficult machine to use with the english keyboard but she had memorised a few program icons that were fun to use and there were a few cool games through one icon in particular Kal ‘ El said he had ‘bookmarked’ for her.

Kara knew she would come to understand it all eventually it’s just getting to that eventually point that was so frustrating. Kal ‘ El had said it might be another year before she could attend school with humans her age as she had just missed the start of a calendar school year. 

Kal ‘ El hadn’t quite explained the yearly calendar to her yet he sometimes seemed to forget she didn’t know or understand basic things about human life that came naturally to him.

With the PC booted up Kara found the icon she needed and clicked it. Excited and all thoughts of boredom were gone as the page loaded.

But it didn’t load onto a page she recognised. Featuring a big red X Kara attempted to decipher the english on the page but some words she hadn’t come across often enough yet for the translation to have stuck. But she got the jist from the icon of the broken wire. Error in connection.

Lowering her glasses she took a quick sweep of the PC with her X Ray vision and found all the wires to be connected properly. So that wasn’t the problem.

Following one of the wires with her usual vision it led out the living room across the small landing with the stairs leading to Kal’ El’s room and out under the inner front door.

She wasn’t supposed to go outside Kara knew that but technically there was another door after this? 

Opening the inner door as quietly as possible so that Kal X wouldn’t hear from where he was on sleep mode in her bedroom she stepped out into the corridor and followed the wire under the carpet to a white box that was plugged into the wall on top of a small table.

Looking at it with both normal and X ray vision there didn’t appear to be anything wrong. Kara sighed and was about to give up when the front door opened. 

A little too startled to move the door opened all the way to reveal a man who didn’t seem that surprised to find her in the corridor.

“Hello” he said pausing before stepping inside and turning to shut and lock the door behind him.

Kara concentrated for a second before replying in english, “Hi”   
The man spoke again and Kara found she didn’t have any trouble understanding him like when Clark spoke english sometimes.

“I’m your neighbour from downstairs, you must be Kara?” 

Kara nodded 

“My names J'onn” he introduced, what brings you into the hallway?” he asked 

Kara not quite sure what to say just pointed to the box she had been trying to figure out 

“The internet down again?” The man sighed and he crouched next to Kara putting his shopping on the floor between them as he picked up the white box. 

“When that happens” he explained to Kara who was rather fascinated by every word the man said just because she could understand, “Flip it over and hit the reset button” he showed Kara and pressed the reset button

“Then wait for all the lights on the front to turn a solid green” he finished putting the box back down and Kara watched fascinated as all the lights flashed before one by one they turned solid green

“Hoi- Thank you” Kara said nearly speaking Kryptonian for a second 

“No problem” J'onn replied as he picked up his shopping from the floor and then himself. He stood studying Kara for a moment before heading towards his flight of stairs at the end of the hallway. Kara stood there for awhile longer before scampering back to her PC closing their inner front door silently behind her as she dashed for the PC. 

\----

The next few weeks were relatively the same except Kara developed a fascination with talking with the downstairs neighbour whenever he came in or out of his basement flat. 

She could understand every word he said and she had yet to be able to figure out why that was, at first she just thought it might be his accent vs Clarks but no she had found a similar speaker on the television and she understood him just as little. 

She didn’t speak to him much other than a few questions she had been able to say in english for quite some time. How are you today ect and she asked Clark on exactly how to say ‘Can you help’ so she could occasionally ask him questions from her workbooks.

He was very kind towards her and always helpful and Kara was learning more from him about human life than Clark. Until one day when Kal X ratted her out.

Normally the small robot happily remains on sleep mode during the day to conserve power. But this had been the day after he had been in the fortress of solitude for a battery charge and the robot hadn’t entered sleep mode and witnessed an interaction between the pair. 

J'onn had just come back from doing something outside and Kara had been waiting as she had heard the gate open and dashed to open the inner front door and sit down and make it look like she had been there all along. 

“Hello J'onn” she said as he came through the door

“Hello Kara” he replied as he turned inside to lock the door again, “Still busy with schoolwork i see” he said 

“Yes” Kara replied, “learning cycles today” she continued in broken english, Turning the page of the work book around so that J'onn could see what she meant where it showed a diagram of the the plant life cycle 

“Ah plant life is rather fascinating isn’t it” J'onn replied, “ It used to be one of my studies at university, are you having trouble with any of it?” 

Kara shook her head, “But what does” she started to ask before slowly reading out the rest “‘precipitation’ mean?” she asked

“Rainfall, like the weather we had yesterday” J'onn replied 

“Thanks” beamed Kara 

J'onn smiled to, “Well if that is everything I must beg your leave” 

Kara nodded, “Bye J'onn!”

“Bye Kara” he half shouted from down the hallway to his own set of stairs. 

That was when Kara slipped back inside the inner front door and then was stood face to face with Kal X

“Doh” she muttered 

Clark was mad when Kal X ratted her out but not at Kara like she suspected he would be, I mean she hadn’t technically even broken the rules about leaving the house - the hallway was still part of the house. But she hadn’t even needed to defend herself with these reasonings as Clark wasn’t directing his anger at her, just the neighbour.

“How long have you been talking with the neighbour?” Clark asked he seemed less angry now and more worried so he was talking fast and Kara was relying on Kal X to translate

“Weeks” Kara replied in her english 

That didn’t seem to have been the answer Clark was looking for as colour from his face seemed to drain and he talked quickly with Kal X too fast for Kara to understand and she was getting frustrated

“I understood!” she tried explaining in english to get Clark's attention

“What?” Clark asked looking at Kara stopping his rapid fire conversaytion with Kal X 

“I understood him” Kara replied

Clark just continued to stare at her in confusion before rapid talking to Kal X again who asked her to clarify in Kryptonian what she meant 

“I understand him when he talks to me… everything he says in english i can understand” Kara tried to explain

Clark just looked even more confused and spoke to Kal again who spoke to Kara and he told her that Master Kal El did not want her to speak to the neighbour again even if it was an emergency

Kara was furious then she hadn’t done anything wrong! She did her work and he was happy to help her learn and she made sure she never bothered him by interrupting his day if he was busy or talking on the phone on his way through.

Letting Clark know her frustration through actions rather than the words that didn’t seem to be getting through she stomped from the kitchen through the hallway into her room and slammed the door. 

She heard the wall crack a little and felt a little guilty but very satisfied at the same time. 

At dinner that night which was a silent affair as Kara refused to speak either language and Clark banned her from the television for a week. Kara didn’t respond at all aside from to stare her cousin down.

She didn’t resent her cousin, after all he had done a lot for her in taking care of her and trying to teach her about earth but what Kara had noticed a trend of was a slow resentment in both him and herself. She resented him pushing earth on her so hard and not to be a kryptonian on earth but as human like as possible he even had never bothered to even try to learn Kryptonian the language of his own people! 

She could also feel some resentment against her since he had been going off to work more often and returning home later than usual not smelling like work but more like he had already eaten which was normally proven as he had takeaway for her in his hand. 

Kara couldn’t understand the resentment and it had only fueled her own small amount more as far as she could tell she was a model cousin and houseguest and she had followed the rules.

Kara was right Clark did have some underlying resentment toward her, it wasn’t a lot but he had been getting closer and closer with a woman at work, Lois. He had been able to go on dates with her after work but nothing more than that. He couldn’t invite her over for dinner because even if he explained Kara as his cousin she wasn’t earth enough yet. She could speak some english and understand some and was getting far in her studies but she had gotten used to using her powers so freely being stuck at home she often didn’t think, excursions outside to the stores ect had been getting less and less as work piled up at the daily planet and he just stopped off on the way home to avoid the hour it took to go around with Kara.

Things were very tense in the alien household, and they were only going to get worse. 

\---


	5. Chapter 5

Kara hadn’t been beyond the inner front door in two weeks and she was bored and fed up of being trapped in a weird kryptonian bubble.

 

Clark had gotten her up haphazardly and her usual meal of a few sandwiches had been left on the side they had been eaten and the rest of the snacks in the house destroyed. Kara had been searching for more when she had found money.

 

Kara had seen clark use this to exchange for food many times when he had taken her to the store. She knew how to get to the store and there seemed like there was a lot of the green paper wadded up so it should cover at least some ice cream.

 

Determined now she was going to prove she could be just like any earthling and get some much needed ice cream Kara slipped into her room to grab a jacket as it was getting much colder outside, she had yet to witness the joyous thing Clark referred too as snow but she was sure it was coming

 

As she went into her room she spotted Kal X in the corner ‘sleeping’ so she had to be very quiet as she grabbed her jacket and then as she exited her room she wedged the door shut from the outside using a broom like she had seen on the tv. Satisfied there was no way Kal X would know what was going on she switched on the TV for cover noise grabbed the spare key from above the door and flew out the door. 

 

She landed quickly in the hallway before turning and locking the door like she had seen Clark do many times and then she exited out the front door and repeated the process.

 

She was right to have grabbed a jacket it was cold and Kara could feel it through her thin trousers and shoes. She should have put the boots on Clark had always insisted she wear outside but Kara liked her rabbit shaped shoes and matching trousers. 

She didn’t really understand the concept of Pajamas and appropriate day wear. Heading out the gate at the front she turned to walk the three small blocks to the store. People stared as she walked but she ignored them and stuck to acting as human as possible and was glad when no one seemed to question her to her face.

 

Stepping into the store as the doors moved out of her way without her asking or needing to push or pull - Kara wasn’t sure why they didn’t have these doors everywhere, she grabbed a basket like she often did when her and Kal came in even though she had only one product and destination in mind.

 

Stepping toward the back of the store where the freezers were she browsed the aisles as she walked but everything looked relatively boring until one aisle in particular which was filled with brightly coloured packets and nice smelling baked goods in packets.

 

Doughnuts! Kara recognised them and grabbed a large box and put it in her basket. Another customer shot her a funny look and Kara froze wondering if the box was really heavy and she should fake strain but the customer moved on so Kara continued to the freezer. 

 

She was wondering what flavour to get, Clark always grabbed the same tub but there was so many types and varieties on display in front of her it was a little overwhelming. Some read interesting types Kara hadn’t been awhere peanut butter could be an ice cream but she grabbed that when she saw it - her sandwiches were always nice enough and a cold version could be interesting. 

 

She was debating on another flavour to get when a commotion began behind her and a loud bang rang out in the store. Kara dropped her basket in shock and turned her X ray vision to see through the shelf stacks to see a gunman threatening the store owner.

 

Kara really didn’t think but she had seen enough news coverage to know this was the type of behavior her cousin sought to stop in the humans. Before any human could blink she was hovering up above the action to get a better look at the situation. 

 

A gunman had entered the store and was threatening the few remaining customers in the store they had all gotten to their knees apart from one and the store worker who had his hands on his heads. 

 

“Give ….me the  money ...” was about all Kara could understand as the man shouted waving his gun about

 

That’s when Kara noticed the man in front of the counter, It was J'onn and he was trying to reason with the robber as the other customers slinked slowly away from the gunman and ran away straight out the store. 

 

“You don’t want to do this” J'onn spoke in the way Kara could understand and now she was in a room with others she could feel something else in the speech she hadn’t noticed before

 

“No I do i’m desperate my family needs the money” the gunman cried, “Stop trying to get in my head!!” he screamed and then fired the gun at J'onn

 

Kara didn’t hesitate and a split second later she was knocking the bullet into the ground and punched the gunman hard in the face with his own gun bending it practically in half in the process. 

 

It was over in a split second for the store clerk who had closed his eyes in shock of what was about to happen he opened them to see the gunman on the ground his weapon bent and lying a few feet from him, the guy that was about to be shot and their was a girl that was not there before in a coat and Pajamas standing defiantly in front of his other customer. 

 

“Okay what the…” He started to say before he went slack jawed and fainted 

 

“We need to leave” J'onn told Kara and together they left the store quickly and Kara followed J'onn to a nearby service alley and Kara could hear police sirens approaching. 

 

Kara wasn’t too sure what to say or do and blindly stood next to J'onn as she watched the police cars speed past to the store. 

 

“Kal’el is going to kill me” she muttered mostly to herself

 

“I hope your cousin has more sense than to do that” J'onn replied to her muttering despite it not being directed at him,

 

Kara frowned then turned to J'onn, “How do you know he’s my cousin?” she asked in Kryptonian angry and not thinking 

 

“The same way I am talking to you Kara” J'onn replied slowly

 

Kara stopped for a second then gasped, “You can understand Kryptonian?” she questioned

 

“Not really” J'onn replied, “My people are natural chameleons our speech and understanding adapt depending on the environment”

 

“Your people?” Kara asked, “You are also not of this world?” she enquired excitedly,

 

“No” J'onn replied, “But this is really not the place for this conversation, we should return to our homes”

 

“No” Kara replied stubbornly, “I just managed to go outside I don’t want to be trapped in their again so soon!” 

 

J'onn sighed in frustration, “You are just as stubborn as my daughters once were” he gruffed before explaining, “I am the last son of mars” 

 

Kara stopped and thought for a second of her studies, she hadn’t bothered too much with learning about space, “That's this solar system!” she blurted, “It's the fourth planet from the sun, it's next door!” she finished

 

“My people were erased nearly 300 years ago” J'onn told her, “I am the sole survivor” 

 

“Same” Kara replied dejected, “Well aside from Kal El but he barely counts he might be Kryptonian but he was raised so human there's barely any kryptonian left”

 

“Kara that's how people like you and me survive” J'onn told her, “Without blending in you can never have a life here!” 

 

Kara huffed but stayed silent J'onn dropped the subject and moved onto other topics,

 

“Why did you come outside today Kara? I know you are not supposed to leave without your cousin?” J'onn asked, 

 

“You know I was told eavesdropping isn’t polite to do” Kara shot back at J'onn who raised his eyebrow and Kara relented,

 

“I was bored” Kara replied, which was half the truth

 

“I know you are lying and I can’t even read your mind” J'onn replied, “Try again”

 

“Read my mind? That’s a cool power” Kara replied, before shrugging “Fine I guess I was hungry, bored and sick of being stuck in that house”

 

“I can do much more than read your mind, in fact now we have spoken I suppose I can do this” He extended his hand toward Kara, “It won’t hurt” he promised as Kara backed away a little from his approaching hand

 

J'onn placed his hand on Kara's head and transferred his knowledge of the english language over to Kara

 

“What did you do?” Kara asked when he let go of her head, “I don’t feel any different”

 

J'onn turned and grabbed a nearby paper from a bin, “Read it”

 

Kara looked at him warily before taking the paper from him

 

“Ah!” she cried in astonishment as she could read and understand every word on the page, “I can understand it!”

 

J'onn nodded and took the grimy paper back from her, “I can’t really transfer such knowledge about anything else without transferring over memories but I thought awhile ago that it would be a kind gift to give to someone struggling so much to adapt to their new life”

 

Kara beamed, “You are the best neighbor ever” she said in english dropping the discussion in Kryptonian and loving how her brain just seemed to know what to say without nearly as much effort as before.

 

“Now let’s get you back home before you cousin gets home and wonders where you are” J'onn told Kara

 

“Yeah, oh no what about that store clerk?!” Kara panicked the reality of what she had done sinking in a little, “He saw me use my powers!”

 

J'onn shook his head and placed a calming hand on Kara's shoulder, literally a calming hand like the calm he sent most nights to stop her nightmares, 

 

“I erased his memory, to him the gunman appeared and he fainted” J'onn told Kara

 

“You can do that too?” Kara replied, “Wow” 

 

J'onn started walking and Kara followed her shoes squelching a little as she walked on the wet ground.

 

“Why are you wearing slippers and pajamas?” asked J'onn mildly interested and trying to keep alien talk gone from the conversation as they walked back home.

 

“They’re cute and comfy” Kara replied, “Or they were before they got wet” she groaned lifting up a foot and squelching it back down

 

“Just to let you know they’re not..” J'onn paused, “This is hard to word and difficult to understand it took me awhile but err - huma- society sets a ‘proper’ way of doing things”

 

“Okayyy” Kara responded slowly

 

“So like Pajamas are nighttime wear just for being in the house in and hu- society has daytime wear for different occasions like smart gatherings or when you're supporting a football team”

 

J'onn struggled in his explanation nearly slipping up twice and mentioning humans like they weren’t one when they could easily be overheard manoeuvring in the streets and when he looked toward Kara she just looked utterly confused,

 

“Do you not have anything similar where your from?” J'onn tried, “Like where I’m from we didn’t have much use for clothes but we did have a formal shape for occasions like births and weddings”

 

Kara’s face looked less confused, “Well I suppose we had to wear a gown when family members were born or married but otherwise I just wore the clothes of the citadel”

 

J'onn nodded, “Well it’s like that but around here” he had nearly slipped up and said humans again, “Around here there seems to be a different dress for everything”

 

Kara looked bemused as they rounded the corner to the house then she looked frightened.

 

“Kal El’s already home” she told J'onn, “This won’t be very nice”

 

They continued the walk in silence and J'onn unlocked the front door and Kara opened the other to be met with one furious Kryptonian

 

“Hi Kal El” Kara greeted sheepishly amid his nearly heat vision gaze

 

“Kara” Clark replied, looking from her to J'onn, “Please come inside” he said slowly thinking Kara still had trouble with english

 

“No” Kara replied, “ I need to introduce you to-” 

 

“Kara inside” Clark seethed cutting into Kara’s words

 

She carried on regardless, “Introduce you to J'onn, the last survivor of Mars” she finished and all of Clark's rage seemed to vanish in an instant

 

“What?” he asked a little thrown back

 

“It is a mighty coincidence three fugitive aliens wound up sharing this house” J'onn said trying to fill in the gaps.

 

Clark looked at him with narrowed eyes, “Yes.. sure” Clark was now thinking their downstairs landlord was a bit nuts. I mean he did live in the basement and now he seemed to be playing along with whatever Kara had told him about her and she was far too trusting.

 

Before he could ask Kara to come inside again she spoke first, “Kal El can we please have J'onn over for dinner? He’s really cool and he’s already taught me tonnes about earth including dress codes and many other things, and I know you haven’t had the time lately…”

 

Clark cut her off, “Kara you are speaking english” he said shocked, “Wait you understand me too”

 

Kara nodded, “J'onn taught me!” she said excited and bounced into the air gracefully, “He can do all kinds of things with his mind and he erased the-” 

 

J'onn cut her off now was definitely not the time for the ‘i stopped a robbery’ conversation, “What Kara is trying to say is this is all real, I am from Mars I am the last survivor of a mass extermination which happened over 300 years ago” J'onn decided then to reveal his true form, or the more human version of his true form

 

Clark just stepped slowly back into the house, “Come on in” he said, “To the madhouse” he finished just looking very overwhelmed. 

 

J'onn, Clark and Kara swapped stories well into the late night. J'onn of course had far more stories than both of them combined having lived out his 300 years on planet earth so Clark called a halt for a short time to order food, then collect it (no point paying delivery charges when it will take no time or energy out of your day to fetch it).

 

Kara eventually couldn’t hide her yawns and Clark packed her off to bed leaving the two elder aliens alone.

 

“So… How long did you know?” Clark asked swirling his drink around.

 

“Since the first night” J'onn replied, “I just never knew how to bring it up” he finished, “I saw Kara today outside in her slippers and followed her” he paused, “She then jumped in front of me to deflect a bullet shot at me by a crazed gunman when my telepathy backfired”

 

Clark put his glass down sharply, “She did wh…” he trailed off, “Oh who am I kidding I would have done the same thing” 

 

“I’ve been helping her inadvertently” J'onn said, “I calm down her nightmares as she projects them out and I kept pretending to leave the house so she could ask me questions out the front door” 

 

Clark laughed a little, “I have been failing a lot in that regard” he paused, “Helping her I just don’t have the time” he looked at J'onn for advice, “Where am I going wrong”

 

J'onn stopped and considered his answer, “You are not her dad” he started, “That's what she needs is a family structure, with just you as a cousin not being around just making everyday okay it's not working for her”

 

Clark put his head in his hands, “But she was meant to do this for me, why can’t I do the same” 

 

J'onn looked confused so Clark quickly explained Karas purpose and how she ended up arriving 25 years too late. 

 

“I can’t just give her over to be adopted though” Clark sighed, “She doesn’t have much natural control of her powers they seem to react to her emotions like I did as a child”

 

“Well that’s because her powers are a child to her, if she only gained them when she got here then they’re only four months old” 

 

“It’s just so much”

 

“Too much for Superman?” J'onn intoned and Clark shot him a look,   
  
“I have to work, Superwork and teach Kara about the world and so far I’ve been dropping the ball on the only one I can afford to drop on” Clark sighed and drained his glass.

 

“Let me help” J'onn said

 

Clark looked at him, “I’ve only known you a few hours..” He started by J'onn cut him off

 

“I’ve been in hiding for a long time… a really long time and I have had nothing to do or help with during that time - When you came out as Superman I was able to help people again using your image”

 

A small look of realisation came over Clark's face, J'onn imagined he was finally realizing why sometimes the news had him in two places at once

 

“That was good for me but then a branch of the government caught on and I had to go back into hiding before they caught me”

 

“The DEO?” Clark questioned

 

“The very same” J'onn replied, “Their leader Hank Henshaw is after my blood, literally he wants it so cadmus can do all kinds of experiments on it” he shuddered, “He does not have a kind mind”

 

“Training Kara or doing minor Superman work I can be useful again without the DEO figuring it out” J'onn proposed, “I get a purpose again and you get help with a teenage superhero who doesn’t understand bunny slippers are not appropriate winter footwear”

 

Clark snorted then regarded J'onn, “Okay you can help with Kara, maybe Super work if I’m stuck in a meeting or something, but so far Metropolis has managed with me like that so I can’t see any issues on that side”

 

He held out his hand for J'onn to shake, “Let us do this”

 

J'onn shook his hand, “You know on Mars to seal a deal we had to merge minds” he commented and Clark blanched

 

“We’re on earth let’s do things the earth way, besides if you were truth telling earlier my mind is a sealed box” Clark finished

 

“What do Kryptonians do?” J'onn asked, knowing the answer but just needing Clark to admit it,

 

“I .. honestly don’t know” Clark replied looking non plussed

 

“Maybe, you should find out” J'onn started, “You know you say Kara came to this earth with you to guide you she can still do that in some ways, teach you things about your planet you not going to know from anyone else”

 

Clark sighed, “You’re right and I know that and now we can easily speak the same language it might work out”

 

J'onn patted him on the shoulder and phased through the floor

 

“Okay that is too cool” Clark commented before turning to head out the kitchen to his own room upstairs. 


	6. Chapter 6

With Kara understanding english her school work soon picked up and soon she was actively learning and engaging with everything. J'onn gave some structure during her days. In the morning he came up through the floor which Kara agreed with Clark was the coolest thing ever and taught her a kitchen appliance at a time for each breakfast food. Some were easier than others to teach for example cereal was pretty basic but soon Kara had mastered the kitchen for breakfast at least. 

After breakfast J'onn would run over maths, he liked to get it out the way in the morning as Kara found no joy in the numbers and re learning such basics but humans weren’t advanced enough for Krypton's techniques so J'onn had to force her into it and show her what human knowledge was. They were always glad when the hour was over.

The rest of the day Kara always enjoyed she had a lot to learn and a big appetite for learning it all. J'onn went through everything in a great structure starting simple with the date and time system, not quite able to explain WHY daylight savings time still happened but explaining how it happened anyway. Kara had then gotten quite excited about Thanksgiving and Christmas as J'onn explained holidays and insisted they celebrated both this year. 

J'onn still hadn’t quite got Kara into the mindset of clothes despite introducing her to a few TV shows he thought might help her understand how you could express yourself in clothing she just continued to sit there in pajamas explaining she was expressing how comfortable and adorable she was. ‘Look they have sleeping puppies on!!’ she explained once pointing to her patterned pajama pants. 

The late afternoons J'onn started work on Kara getting a better control of her powers, allowing them to be triggered and not based on emotions she was feeling. This involved a fair bit of meditation which Kara would fidget during and sometimes fall out of midair and onto the floor meaning the living room had to be coated in pillows for its safety.

Then when Clark was home Kara got a little break to do whatever she wanted which recently was teach Clark about Krypton while J'onn cooked for all three of them. After they ate Kara would get lessons in her powers every other weekday Superman or Clark due on a date depending. 

\--- 

Karas lessons on her powers to start with was the two kryptonians play fighting over the ocean. It was the best way Clark could think of to just let Kara let loose and see what her powers could do as over the ocean they couldn’t hurt anything not even each other. 

This method of practise went well for the first few sessions they had Kara could barely land a hit as Clark was far more maneuverable in the air than her despite her having a faster speed once she got going. Soon though they had to rethink their location as Kara got more maneuverability on Clark and crashed them both into the ocean which was fine for them but not the many nighttime beach go-ers a few miles in land who ended up nearly washed out to see by a larger than normal wave that came a good few metres higher than any other wave that day. 

Deciding that land would definitely be the better option for the next few sessions Clark took them out into the desert and they trained their with J'onn nearby to keep his mind out for people who might see them.

Clark was more powerful than Kara, having been on earth longer it was the theory he had absorbed more of the solar radiation than her so he did pull his punches a little however Kara who had a better metabolism as a teenager wasn’t far behind him in strength.

She couldn’t use her heat vision very well as she found it hard to build the anger that triggered it but her other powers were coming along. Her flight was improving chasing Clark and her strength was being built up in her muscles. Freeze breathe Kara liked to use as a way of winning by sneaking up on Clark and just breathing a little onto the back of his neck and when he momentarily jumped no matter how many times she did it she would kick him into the desert floor leaving a decent sized crater.

 

This pattern of training and teaching continued well after Christmas and into the new year. Kara was getting good and nearly up to her age level in schooling, her powers were still reactive to her emotions but she would notice them now instead of just allowing them to happen like a natural extension of her body.

Clothes she still wasn’t… great at them but she had finally found her own style after dragging J'onn out on a expedition one weekend Clark was out wooing Lois again.

“Okay we both hate this” Kara started and J'onn raised an eyebrow pretty sure that Kara was just pretending to hate it, “But you keep saying I can’t wear pajamas and that's really all I have”

J'onn knew she was lying he had seen her wardrobe.

“Okay it’s not all I have but it’s all I like!” Kara moaned 

“Lets just get on with this!” J'onn intoned and walked off down the highstreet Kara skipping a little too high behind him. 

Dungarees were a win, as was a mass of superman t-shirts from the boys / men's section, Kara complaining that they were far too clingy and not comfortable and baggy at all. She also got herself a bag ‘what I am going to school this year right?’ and grabbed appropriate footwear… ish

“They’re rainbow” J'onn deadpanned staring at them 

“They have rubber soles!” Kara wheedled 

In the end she got them and some normal black ones as well in the same style. Which a few months later had still yet to be worn but Clark couldn’t blame J'onn for trying by getting them. 

Soon it was spring and J'onn and Clark were looking at getting Kara some official ID. Both of them although not being from this planet hadn’t got the faintest Idea of how to get Kara an identity.

“This would be a lot simpler if we all had shape shifting abilities” moaned Clark staring at the computer that listed ways of getting identification on the government website if it had been lost or stolen

“Or a time machine to go back and register her birth” J'onn added and Clark shot him a look

“What I thought we were naming impossible ways for this to work?” J'onn replied sarcastically

Clark continued to stare at him, “You… need to stop watching TV with Kara” he sighed before shutting down the PC

“We’ll have to fake her ID” J’onn stated simply

“Any idea on how to do that?” J'onn asked 

“No” sighed Clark, “I don’t even know anyone that does” he moaned and ran his face through his hands

“Maybe Kara doesn’t go to school then… keep homeschooling her?” J'onn suggested even though he knew it was stupid Kara was excited about earth and excited to join in with the world around her she knew she had to wait until the next school year started to join in with children her age which was probably the only reason she hadn’t gone a bit loopy being stuck with less and less engaging things at home.

“We’ll leave it for now” Clark said adjusting his glasses back on his face from where he had knocked them askew, “I’ll poke around people at work maybe it’s a long shot another reporter might know” 

“Orrrr…” J'onn suggested slowly, “I come to work with you tomorrow and look into their minds for the information so they aren't wondering why farm boy Clark Kent might want to get some fake ID”

“We leave Kara on her own?” Clark replied hesitantly 

“She’s been outside on her own a lot she's hardly going to destroy the house in the few hours I’m gone” J’onn replied but he didn’t look as confident as he sounded.

“Yeah but .. I was always following her” Clark responded J'onn looked surprised then a little guilty and added, “Same” 

Clark snorted, “Okay we trust her for a few hours, what’s the worst that could happen?”

\---

Well

The day started off okay, Kara insisted on making them both breakfast after J'onn appeared through the floor per their morning ritual so both quickly opted for cereal and Kara huffed but joined them. Between all three well mostly Clark and Kara the cereal box was empty by the time they were done. 

“I’ll recycle it!” Kara cried and grabbed the box and headed to the garden where the bin was. She was pretty big on recycling and saving the planet - after all she had already seen one destroyed.

“Right Kara” Clark started as she came back inside and she looked to him, “J'onn is coming with me to work today so you’re going to be on your own until about mid afternoon, You okay with that?”

Kara tried to hide her wide grin, “Yes Cousin that’s fine” 

“Well okay then, we’re” he motioned to himself and J'onn “Going to head off” and then they headed upstairs to Clarks room to exit via the skylight

“Did you have this put in to fly out of?” Clark asked when they were up their curious as to the answer

“No.. I once accidentally .. I made a hole in the roof and it was cheaper to put a window in than rectify my mistake” J’onn replied

Clark looked at him, “I’m actually not going to ask what you did to create a hole in the ceiling” 

“Best not to” and then J'onn levitated and transformed into a small lizard and placed himself in Clark's pocket 

“Eh did you have to be a Lizard” Moaned Clark and he received a glare in response from the lizard in question.

“Wow did not know Lizards could make that expression” and before J'onn could do anything in response he flew off toward work along his usual flight plan ending in the spot near the nearby subway. 

Clark pulled his phone out his pocket and put it to his ear, “Okay so just let me know when you leave.. Somehow” he said into the phone but really talking to J'onn

“I will make sure to let you know” J'onn replied and Clark had to resist jumping really far into the air in surprise

“Holy … you can still talk” Clark said, getting a weird look from a passerby as to the conversation he was having into his phone 

“You know for all the smarts you showed getting out your phone to talk to me you really are quite stupid” J'onn replied 

“I’m hanging up” Clark replied and put his phone back in his pocket and continued on the short walk to the office. 

Clark continued with his work as usual as though at one point a tiny lizard didn’t crawl out his pocket and go on an expedition around the office. 

They had a surprise guest today, the live news network part of the planet had brought in some fancy businessman who was donating a lot to the charities to do a puff piece, it wasn’t interesting for Clark but it had the other reporters gossiping a little talking about how he had arrived by private helicopter so it wasn’t like he was giving much of his wealth away.

Clark had nodded and agreed as he was by the coffee machine but otherwise he was blanking them. Leaning back in his chair writing up his notes for the latest article he was working on when his hearing and superior vision caught the sight of a Lizard heading into the lift. Shocked a little he held his strange pose of leaning on the back of his chair as he watched the doors shut and the Lizard gave a tiny wave.

Well that was definitely J'onn…. either that or someone had put something in the coffee.

Sitting back forwards in his chair he tilted his glasses down to watch where J'onn was going with his X ray vision. 

After a long time in the lift he finally hopped off on the top floor and then Clark lost him as he changed shape and the skeleton changed.

He let out a frustrated sigh and went back to his work, maybe J'onn had gotten curious about the fancy businessman and wanted to meet him himself, either way he had an article to write and a deadline to fulfill. 

J’onn’s Point of View 

 

Once J'onn was out of Clarks ridiculously warm pocket and out and about in the office he started scanning the minds of the people around him. His plan was just to find someone who knew how to create a fake identity so he could glean the knowledge and hopefully replicate it.

After finding out far too much stuff about humanity J'onn was going to give up. He had almost searched the whole building for possible candidates. He could sweep minds at a distance for current thoughts and feelings but he did require eye contact when searching for exact information. Luckily his range covered the whole building so he hadn’t had to crawl far when he felt new minds arriving on the roof.

He gave these minds a cursory glance with his mind to see who they were two were focused minds on the tasks they were completing. They were private helicopter pilots who were concentrating on landing on the roof. Not bothering to probe deeper while they were concentrating on such a task J'onn turned his attention to the mind in the back of the Helicopter.

If anyone was looking at his little lizards face at that moment they would have seen a very real expression on its face. One of complete shock.

This mans mind was very structured like he had spent a long time creating a fortress inside himself. It was something J'onn did not often find in humans as such he couldn’t tell much from him other than what was on his mind at that present time and where his thoughts were wondering.

Which right now were musing the last time he saw this building and he was wearing a very different kind of suit. With a symbol on it J'onn recognised from numerous newspaper articles and he was joined by someone he loved and the reason he was here. An image of a boy around Kara’s age was in his mind a lot as well.

If this guy was Batman J'onn had to see it for himself, Bruce Wayne is batman? Well him and Clark had never really thought that he would help, he had never even been suggested as a possibility I mean it's not like you could write letters and he refused to work with Superman… but if he had his own child it's possible if they turned up on his doorstep they would listen. 

Slinking to the lift and then inside and travelling it to the top floor he slipped inside the unoccupied men's room on the floor and exited as a nameless face with a matching ID on his clothes. It took some concentration so he was in the stall a short while before leaving and he had missed his chance to look the man in the eyes for a better connection as Bruce Wayne had already entered the makeup room to get ready for his TV interview. 

Clark would surely know where the billionaire lived… Nevermind a deeper scan then. 

Calling the lift back to the floor he stepped inside the empty elevator and rode it all the way down the building and out the door. 

Not being able to create a working phone he asked a passerby for change for the payphone nearby and they kindly gave him more than he needed and he quickly dialed clark. 

Clarks Point of View:

It was only twenty minutes later when he got a call on his phone, he didn’t recognise the number but answered it anyway incase it was a source using a different line.

“Hello-” he started aiming for his usual phone greeting when he was cut off

“You know this whole operation would cost a lot less if I could just telepathically communicate” the voice on the other end said, “You know how much payphones cost?”

“Getting to the point will cost you less” Clark replied and he could practically feel the glare that he no doubt produced on J'onns face

“Bruce Wayne, the big fancy businessman he can help us” 

“...Out of everyone in the building that guy is the guy?” Clark questioned trying to keep his voice low and neutral so as not to attract attention

“Oh yes he is” J'onn said and Clark could feel the smile on his friends face.

“I thought the point of this was to gain the knowledge on how to make the thing we need” Clark replied straying away from any buzzwords in the office

“I gained lots of knowledge believe me”

“Wait are you talking about blackmail?” Clark replied practically whispering now

“Clark -” J'onn started but the line went dead. 

Clark looked at his phone then flipped it closed and it started ringing again a second later, 

“Hel-” Clark started before J'onn cut him off, “He’s Batman”

Clark paused, “Billionaire rich guy donates tonnes to children's charities and you think he’s”

“Not think- Know” J'onn replied

“This is insane” 

“Your Superman”

“.. See you at home” and Clark hung up. 

J’onn popped the payphone back on the cradle and deciding the payphone wasn’t secure enough to shapeshift in he headed out and down a nearby alley to transform into an everyday seagull to fly home earlier than expected.

Hearing loud music and Kara dancing her socks off as he approached he decided to give her longer to enjoy some alone time and phased into the basement from his seagull form to do some checks on his own computer as to Bruce Wayne. 

\-----

When Clark got home he was surprised J'onn wasn’t their. Kara however was just bursting with excitement to tell Clark all about her day and how nothing had gone wrong and she had even made tea for them all.

Clark was a little nervous at the prospect of Karas cooking but couldn’t say no to that excited face who had clearly had a good day

“Where is Tanthu?” Kara asked, she had started to call J'onn that as a term of endearment to her she said there was no english translation only that it meant a non kryptonian worthy of great respect. 

“He should be here soon” Clark replied not really sure where the martian was at but he didn’t need to act much longer as said martian eased through the wall next to him making him jump though he tried to hide it.

“Tanthu I made us all dinner!” Kara said excitedly and flew up and off into the kitchen

“Where have you been all day?” Clark asked trying to mutter quietly to J'onn who was about to reply when Kara called out “My super hearing works perfectly fine and I can’t hear any footsteps heading to the dining table!”

Clark and J'onn shared an amused look before joining Kara to see what she had created for them. They had bought her a few cooking books but she insisted the recipes were all boring so she enjoyed to experiment resulting in… interesting flavours to say the least. Humans would struggle at any rate.


	7. Chapter 7

Once Kara was asleep and it had been confirmed multiple times that it was the case Clark finally got to question J'onn about his earlier information grabbing. 

“So I kind of cut you off before” Clark started from where they were still seated around the dining table

“Well I did rather drop a bombshell on you” J'onn replied shifting in his seat and catching Clarks expression so he continued.

“You mean the small fact of man who refuses to work with Superman on any kind of incident in gotham… even if it's alien in origin is billionaire Bruce Wayne” Clark repeated back to him slowly

“Yes” J’onn replied

 

“Look” Clark started, “If there is anyone who can do something as simple as fake an ID it's Batman but I didn’t mention Batman before as an option because there is no way he would help us and I can’t really imagine us blackmailing him with revealing his secret identity to do the work will help us either since he kind of has to know our secret identity’s for him to create an identity” Clark explained

“We’re not going to threaten anything of the sort” J'onn started, “It’s far too dangerous to threaten Batman no mind Bruce Wayne and Batman” he continued seeing the confused look on Clark's face, “No what I saw in his mind he has a son he adopted, he is about Kara’s age I saw from the flashes of memory in his head as he was in his thoughts”

Clarks reporter side kicked in as he leaned forward toward J'onn, “Bruce Wayne, most eligible bachelor three years running has a kid??”

“Adopted” Clark added, “From the same center he is currently sponsoring, why he was interviewed today”

“So we are going to blackmail him to help us using knowledge of the fact he has a son” Clark summarised

“No, we’re just going to ask him nicely” J'onn replied, “I’m rather worried about Superman's obsession with blackmail though”

Clark glared, “Come on J'onn” Clark started putting a hand up, “You haven’t met the guy, there no way asking nicely is going to work, he’s so cold”

J'onn interrupted him, “You’ve seen his exterior I imagine you have to have a tough one fighting crime in gotham with no superpowers , i’ve seen inside his mind and he would help us”

Clark looked skeptical, “Oookay when do you want to to do this?” he asked

“Well we can go now... “ J'onn started, “He does work nights” 

\-----

After sending calming waves to Kara before he left incase she had a nightmare him and Clark headed out to Gotham city. Both flying high in the night sky to avoid detection. The flight wasn’t a long one and soon they were overlooking gotham bay from the sky. 

“So where exactly is Wayne Manor?” asked Clark who had forgone his Superman outfit but was still wearing it under his clothes

“Give me a second I was working off a road map it's hard to get bearings in the air” J'onn muttered but knew with clark's super hearing he would hear him anyway  
Spotting the main road he was looking for he flew off and headed into the outskirts of Gotham

“Just a thought but maybe if it's night he might not be at home?” Questioned Clark suddenly

“He’s home I can sense him” replied J'onn though that was rather lucky now clark mentioned it

Landing on the front step to what looked like the main door they debated knocking before Clark winged it and wrapped the old style handle.

A light came on in the distance, this house must be huge and Clark heard footsteps from a back room slowly make their way through the house to the door. Which creaked open a notch to see who it was.

“I’m afraid it's rather late for visitors” the man said as the door opened wider. 

J'onn took point on this, “We have a pretty important favour to ask” he started 

“Well I’m sure whatever it is can wait until Morning” the man who J'onn could now see was in a butler's uniform went to close the door but Clark stopped him.

“It really can’t it's kind of involving something Mr Wayne does at this time of night” Clark tried he really didn’t want to have to reveal anything to anyone more than he already had to 

“I assure you Master Wayne is currently resting and is not up to anything at this time of night!” The Butler retorted 

Clark gave up at this point, “Could you just tell him Superman is here?” then he must have heard something with his super hearing

“I take offense to being called that you know” he replied to a voice neither J'onn or the butler could hear then a voice cut through on an intercom

“Show them down Alfred” came the gruff voice and Alfred as his name was rose an eyebrow but allowed them in all the same and pointedly stared at them until they took their shoes off. Clark did as he was suggested and Alfred openly gaped as J'onn just switched his appearance to that of a man wearing socks instead of shoes. 

“Right this way sirs” he said recovering himself far quicker than J'onn would have expected but then again it’s not everyday your boss is the goddamn batman

Alfred led them through the house and then pressing a certain piano key allowing a door to open in the wall he led them through grabbing one of a pile of torches at the top of the stairs to help his descent. Neither Clark or J'onn needed to grab one and neither were they offered one. 

Clark whistled a little impressed when he saw the cave. Now this was impressive tech, if he ever lost his powers he knew who he was coming too to help. J'onn was similarly impressed.   
“So what brings the man of steel to my cave” The voice growled out from the distance hidden in the dark 

“Why are you so melodramatic Master Wayne, they clearly know who you are!” Alfred childed and then turned to the two

“Would either of you like a beverage?” he offered and both of them politely declined and Alfred began walking back up the steps muttering to himself about what a strange man master wayne was

Bruce did listen to his butler's advice though and did come out of the shadows to face Clark and J'onn. 

He didn’t say anything he was maskless and it took Clark a second to realise he had never answered the question, 

“Sorry yes we need to ask a favour of you as you may have heard before” Clark started and then paused to see if he should go on Bruce gave no visual cues as to what to do so he continued,

“I have a cousin her name is Kara, and she needs ID or a birth certificate- something so that she could have a normal life here” He blurted out 

“And you came to me?” he asked confused, “You're already an alien immigrant and i'm assuming you are too” he indicated J'onn “so you know how”

Clark sighed, “Both of us got our ID by fluke not by fabricating anything. In order for her to get any ID she needs to have been registered and it's all done electronically now so I have no idea how to make it look like she was born 12 years ago…” Clark trailed off

“I get a favour to ask of either of you in return” Bruce stipulated, “Not that I need your help but occasionally your talents would be useful on some missions”

He turned to his rather oversized computer. (In J’onn opinion, who needed a screen that big was he as blind as a bat?) 

“Name?” Batman started

“Err Kara Zor-El” Clark said and J'onn pinched his eyebrows together, “He means for her ID, she can’t have her Kryptonian name” he sighed at Clark wondering if the sun that gifted him powers was slowly frying his brain

“Oh well El means star so maybe that would work?” Clark added sheepishly

“Kara Star” Batman huffed uninterested, “Any middle names?”

“Um… Allura was her mother so Laura?” Clark supplied

“Date of Birth” Batman asked and Clark froze… “Err”

“22nd September” J'onn inputted and then answered Clarks quizzical look “What? I helped her figure out her birthday from the Kryptonian to earth calendar”

“I missed it” Clark muttered slightly thinking back to September. Having been just moved into the new house at that point he really hadn’t tried to get to know her and really it fast coming up to the year anniversary of her arrival so he really should have realised they were yet to celebrate a birthday, his own was next month and he already had small plans of introducing Lois to his cousin. 

“So mother is Laura Star and Father is?” Bruce asked ignoring the conversation around him

“Bruce?” Clark blindly suggested having no idea of how to translate her uncle's name but even that didn’t get a reaction from the stoic Batman. 

“Okay I have all the information but I do need to give it a year” Bruce reminded, “How old is the girl?”

“She is 12” 

Soon all the needed details were inputted along with Bruce also pressing them with various questions amid filling out Kara’s faked background of a fire ect. It didn’t take long Bruce was terribly efficient at not only filling out a fake ID but pressing both Jon and Clark for information about themselves. 

Later on with the assurance that everything had been completed and Bruce’s silence on the matter provided he got to utilize J'onns unique skills for a mission sometime in the future, he insisted for nothing too heavy handed but not needing to interrogate a subject to get answers even Bruce admitted that kind of power is useful to him. He can pretty much replicate everything Superman can do and he can pretty much sneak anywhere he wants but mind reading not so much.

Kara was more than excited she could start looking at schools seriously with the two of them and they looked all into the ones in the local area… and not so local area but Clark insisted it would be a better experience getting the bus or walking to school rather than flying because then she could bring friends back to play 

She soon agreed and they had it narrowed to three. The first interview they went to was more than amusing the headteacher was so flustered and wasn’t exactly very welcoming when Clark and J'onn were introduced as her caregivers. Kara was really confused as was Clark - J'onn just stuck to glaring literal holes in the woman's head the entire time. 

Kara did like the school despite her Tanthu clearly not liking the headteacher and Clark finally clued in on the woman's reaction as they were leaving. He suggested that maybe next school they visited he shapeshifted into a woman which J'onn flatly refused, “Would you really like her to go a school who thinks like that woman does?” 

Clark understood then and didn’t broach the subject again. He didn’t mind the assumption they were a couple, I mean after all a headteacher that wasn’t even open to her own race having equal rights probably shouldn’t be anywhere near a teenage alien. Let them assume and weed out the terrible teachers.  
Eventually they all agreed on the second school they visited. Kara would have to catch a bus but Clark and J'onn agreed silently it would be good for Kara to have to be awake and needing to be somewhere at a certain time to avoid her relying on her powers to get places on time.

They did remind her that quite a few of the photos in her bedroom would have to be taken down before anyone came over to visit. Kara had nearly filled a whole wall with photos of her new life and family. Quite a lot of them not fit to be seen by humans hence why J'onn and Clark had developed them in his basement for her after taking the time to learn how from Clark’s friend Jimmy. Photos she had taken of Clark and her in midair and in various strength poses holding up boulders. There was also lots of J'onn in his Martian shape around the house when Kara had been balancing things on his head when he had slipped rather deep into meditation and shape shifting ones as well. 

They probably shouldn't even have developed them and they definitely should destroy them since bruce had let them know there was threats out there against them but both of them had far too much weakness when it came to making Kara happy.

It wasn’t long before Bruce required J'onn’s skills and he headed off. He didn’t think he would be gone long so none of them thought anything of it. Kara said she would miss him at which point he laughed and said she wouldn’t she was looking forward too much to having the house to herself for a few days while Clark was at work. They agreed he would be back for Clark’s birthday celebrations and the big meeting of Lois.


	8. Chapter 8

J'onn had been gone about three days when Clark awoke with a start to the sound of a muffled scream from Kara’s room. Heading downstairs at superspeed he wasn’t expecting the punch to the face that awaited him. 

Shocked he stepped back expecting to see a monster but it was Kara who was violently shaking in her pajamas. He only caught a glimpse before she shot off through her sliding door into the garden shattering it into tiny pieces all over her room and the garden. 

Putting on his super suit he sped after her but she was faster, she had been for months now. She landed eventually and painfully it looked onto a roof in downtown metropolis. Still moving erratically when she righted herself Clark landed in front of her on the opposite side of the roof.

“Kara!” he shouted as there was a little wind, “What’s going on” 

He studied her behaviour a little and then it reminded him of when she was having night terrors and she hadn’t responded to his question either which led him to the conclusion Kara was asleep and had no idea what she was doing.

He had better get her inside fast before anyone called the media about a superman sighting. It was dark but in the city not exactly blackout, and certainly not asleep.

“Kara please wake up” Clark tried to say and zipped next to her to try to grab her shoulder and shake her awake but it didn’t work and he only succeeded in getting a punch to the face that did some serious damage this time as he flew back and smashed into another large building. 

Pulling himself out of the crack he had created in the building he flew back toward Kara and tried to grab her but she dodged and struck out at him with her heat vision which he dodged resulting in the roof of the building began to be damaged. Kara turned her head to follow where Clark had gone but did not turn off her heat vision resulting a large amount of damage to the surrounding buildings. 

Clark could hear the news helicopters now and was sure Kara could too as she held her head and then flew off away from them. Clark hot on her heels. The back and forth went on as Clark would try to subdue her without causing any harm and she would resist with definitely not the same sentiment. 

The cameras were definitely on them now and Clark was trying desperately to wake Kara up or at least lure her away from the city but Kara amid in night terrors really wasn’t reacting well to any attempts to be near her and wake her up nor did she seem to want to be away from the city.

They were definitely on the news now. Clark could hear various channels people in the city were tuning into with the various reactions to him and Kara

Suddenly Kara faltered and Clark was able to grab her and flew out of sight from the cameras quickly as Kara fell to a restful sleep in his arms and seconds later another Kara was at his side. 

“We need to make the media change its story, Bruce warned me before I left that someone's been poking around at Kara’s fake file this isn’t good for her” Clark nodded and quickly put her down on a nearby roof and flew off after the Kara shaped J'onn.

They put on a show J'onn eventually changing shape so often that clark could hear with his super hearing they were no longer asking who the small blonde girl was as J’onn had been everything since. Including a dragon

Clark noted that the faster he switched between shapes they were all green before detail added later. 

They ‘battled’ for another five minutes J'onn even realistically recreating heat vision but not the effects so Clark had to act a little but they both wrapped it up quickly with Superman ‘winning’ and J'onn was whisked away morphing back into a basic human form. 

Clark grabbed Kara from the rooftop at superspeed and they zoomed home as fast as possible, neither of them were getting any sleep tonight as opposed to Kara as she slept on peacefully.

\----  
Clark was in full blown panic mode as he put Kara into his bed as her room was currently freezing thanks to the broken window. He was pacing back and forth in the living room as J'onn was calmly watching the TV seeing exactly what they were showing on the news in the highlights.

“She’s barely on the footage” J'onn told clark on his fifth room rotation

“She’s still on the news, what if they figure out who she is?” Clark fretted

“Says the man saving the city everyday without a mask” J'onn snapped in reply

“But you said Bruce warned us about laying low” Clark retorted, “That wasn’t very low!” 

“We can’t help it now it’s out there, thankfully 90% of the news is about a shapeshifter and not about a young girl with powers exactly like supermans, the story would never end if that was the case - reporters would never stop asking you who she is” J'onn retorted

Clark narrowed his eyes at J'onn, “That's very well thought out”

J'onn sighed, “It's exactly what Bruce told me not to do, I was still with him when we caught the early news before it hit the tv screens, thank god for Alfred on that by the way and he tried to stop me and the scenario I enacted I got straight from his head as ‘worse case scenario’ but I thought it was a wiser choice than letting Kara be exposed”

Clark slowed and nodded then collapsed onto the sofa behind him which sagged under the strain of the force he put into the fall. 

“I’ll call the contractors in the morning about the windows” J'onn said turning off the TV, “and if you feel like sleep you can use my bed downstairs, I don’t think I have ever actually used it so while Kara’s on yours you are free to use mine” 

Clark muttered a thanks and wandered off to head down to the basement. It was rare he used the stairs to get to J'onns flat as he normally phased with J'onn but he stayed upstairs and moved to begin meditating in midair above the coffee table. 

\---

In the morning Kara awoke first, confused as to her location and as to why her eyes stung and she could feel slightly bruised though she had clearly already healed the worst of it under the sunlight of the skylight. 

Stretching and getting up she noticed her pajamas were covered in brick dust and, was that blood?

Kara cried out then a little fearful and both her caregivers were there in seconds to see what was wrong Kara just held up her arms and Clark swept her into a hug. 

“What happened?” Kara asked as she cling to him with enough strength to crush a car 

“You had a night terror” J'onn explained, “Like you’ve had before but this time you were sleepwalking in the city”

Kara looked miserable, “Is everyone okay?” she asked, “I can tell I used a lot of my heat vision, did I hurt anyone?”

“Just my ego” Clark replied and he got a watery smile for his comforting efforts, “J'onn managed to get back in time to calm you down and we distracted the attention off you” 

“How?” Kara asked and with a wordless glance Clark carried Kara down to the TV so she could see for herself on the news channel

They put it on with subtitles so they could explain what had happened while they were looking at the footage, “They’re focusing mostly on the shapeshifting ability and not on you Kara” Clark softly explained

Kara looked back to J'onn, “Tanthu why did you do that if you had calmed me down and I wasn’t a threat anymore why did you put yourself in danger?”

J'onn sighed letting his breathe out for longer than necessary, “If it had just been left with the footage of you vs Superman there would be speculation as to who you are to superman, why he didn’t attack you and why you seemed to have powers like his, there would be talk for months to see if you were his child… “ he trailed off, “Bruce had it all organised in his mind but this was the only way I could see of securing your future, you want to be like Clark don’t you?”

Kara nodded, “I’m not ready yet but I really want to help” she agreed, 

“So wouldn’t this” he gestured to the TV, “Your first TV appearance as the bad guy have a really negative start to all that, Clark would have questions to answer as Superman and it would be the new big scandal”

Kara frowned, “It shouldn’t be though this is your personal life” 

Clark laughed, “You must have been on earth long enough now to understand the celebrity concept” 

Kara wrinkled her nose, “Maybe I could change the story one day” she mused before she stood up and turned off the TV

“Thank you Tanthu” she said to J’onn and also treated him to a warm hug before heading to her room.

“AHH” She screamed in shock as she entered, “What did I do?!” she exclaimed as she saw the hot mess that was her room. Before she had awoken and flown on her rampage she had really destroyed the furniture in her room. Glass and splinters of wood were everywhere.

“It can be fixed” Clark assured and J'onn nodded behind him , “If you take the photos down I’ll call someone to come and fix the window” he assured from behind them and Kara began to take her photos down slowly and pack them into a box. 

\-----

It was only a few days and everything in the house had gone back to normal. The window was fixed and Kara had new furniture (well furniture from J’onns basement flat, which he really wasn’t using - he practically lived with the two of them so what was the harm) Clark had also stolen his mattress and swapped it for his older worn one claiming it since it wasn’t used and was apparently the best nights sleep he had had in ages.. 

Life just seemed to go back, the shapeshifting bad guy was off the news after only a day as other villains would always pop up and Superman would be there to stop them. Both Clark and J'onn now thought that Bruce really was just paranoid and that really they had no cause for alarm.

Both of them regretted this thinking now.


	9. Chapter 9

It was only a week later, exactly two days before Clarks birthday. Kara had been beyond excited and was planning a Kryptonian birthday ritual as Clark had never had one since his birth blessing and she had been practising the wording and insisted Clark fetch Kal X from the fortress of solitude so she could make sure she had remembered the wording correctly. 

Superman was on a mission. It was yet again cutting into his work day and he was a little annoyed especially as he was pretty sure he had already captured this particular fort rozz escapee a few weeks ago and dropped him off for the DEO. Maybe they weren’t taking prisoners anymore… perhaps he got out either way he was slightly ruining his day and Clark couldn’t even be bothered to let the guy monologue himself into capture. He just went straight into the fight to get it over with . Minimal damage done to city and himself. 

Sometimes he liked the show of it and he could always count on a really stupidly good bad guy quote he could write into his articles but he really wasn’t in the mood today especially considering he was dead sure this was a repeat capture.

Dragging an unconscious bad alien behind him Clark landed at the DEO. Normally he would walk a few paces into the tunnel before throwing the bad guy down and leaving making as much noise as possible with his movements to catch attention on cameras and with his footfalls so the prisoner would be taken in.

But this time he decided to go deeper into the tunnel to make sure they noticed and took this guy into custody. That's when things went badly wrong.

The next thing he knew was pain. He had never experienced pain before except during a solar eclipse but even then that must have barely been pain compared to what he was suffering now.

He didn’t notice as he was whisked away down the tunnel and strapped to an examination table. 

When he opened his eyes all he could see was green, he was so weak and in pain he didn’t really noticed as they raided the pockets of his supersuit. 

“It was a trap” he moaned and he didn’t realise he said it outloud as the face of Hank Henshaw blocked the green light that was above and all around him

“Indeed it was Mr Kent” he replied and it took Clarks pain fuzzed brain a second to realise he had said his name and not referred to him as Superman. 

“No” he tried weakly protesting

“Too late” Henshaw replied, “But I suppose you might be pleased to know wiping your existence from the face of the earth is not my goal today”

He leaned forward right into Clark's face, “Where did you put the Martian” he said dangerously, “I know you fought him last week and I was so excited for that delivery but it never came, you are a week late” he spat and Clark could feel the wet spittle on his face

“Where is the Martian” he repeated

“I .. Don’t know” Clark replied his mind whirring fast, Bruce was right Henshaw had a suspicion and last week would have confirmed everything and now he was here for his prize. 

“Liar” Henshaw replied, “Tell me or the pain gets worse, there is no way you let that parasite go” 

This guy had some serious beef with J'onn Clarks brain thought idly as it tried to escape the pain it was so unused to.

“He escaped” Clark tried but a shock of pain went through his nervous system.

“Lair” 

Everytime Clark evaded the question but the pain was getting worse,

“You know this rock is from your own planet” Henshaw started explaining as a bit of a respite as Clark tried to breathe, “We found it lining the cells in Fort Rozz of all the Kryptonian prisoners” he laughed, “Did you know you're not the only one left?” he added 

 

“I’ll tell you all about who they are if you tell me where the martian is” Henshaw bargained, the pain wasn’t working so he was trying to exploit clarks weaknesses. 

“I don’t know” Clark croaked not even sure how long he had been strapped to this bed, He was disorientated, did Henshaw say there were other Kryptonians?

Henshaw paused as an alert tone rang sharply through his phone and he exited the room Clark was being held in so Clark took the opportunity to maybe try and wiggle free of the green penetrating light that seemed to go right through him like a knife. He was unsuccessful but he did manage to turn his head to the side hoping his heat vision would work but it wouldn’t. He couldn’t even get his eyes to change. 

“Oh good you're already looking the right way” Clark heard Henshaws voice from the door and suddenly a laptop screen was in front of him

“I wonder who she is, too young to be your partner I should hope unless aliens are sicker than I thought, too old to be your daughter unless your biology is freaky so I’m going with sister” Henshaw rambled as Clark watched a short clip of Kara in her room floating above her bed in meditation. It repeated itself as Clark watched wondering how they found her.

“Handy things Driver's licenses, name, address, age, height … everything I needed to know about Superman in a little package” Henshaw laughed.

“Now tell me where the martian is or whoever that girl is in your house is going to die. I have teams outside ready to storm in, do you really want her to die Clark” Henshaw mocked

Clarks brain was going a mile a minute, if they had Kryptonite on them they could really hurt Kara, J'onn would do anything to keep her safe as would he but he couldn’t tell them J’onn was in the house too. 

Then again if they were close enough to the house J'onn would know they’re their…

“Thats a lot of silence from a guy who could be choosing about a young girl's life, surely the answer should be straight out, she's not part of this - you let the martian go”

“Now this is the last time I ask, where is he” 

Clark laughed out loud suddenly, “He’s behind you” he cackled almost deliriously and Henshaw turned on the spot gun raised in alarm but it was too late for him as he received a resounding punch to the face knocking him to the ground and smashing his head further on the bed clark was strapped too.

J'onn then transformed into Henshaw moving to the control panel around the side of the bed and Phasing his hand through it casually and the kryptonite cage that was holding Clark hostage spluttered then switched off. 

J'onn then moved as Henshaw and helped Clark up, “How?” he asked weakly his strength not having returned yet

“Not the time lets just get out of here” J'onn replied and he jumped and phased them both to the surface and out into the open desert space where he sped off

Clark was still really weak when they landed in a place he just about recognised and he was hit with a speeding bullet of hugs from Kara 

“Cousin!” she cried as she saw how hurt he was. Clark accepted her hugs as he looked around and realised he was in the Bat cave.

Complete with one grumpy Batman / Bruce Wayne and a boy Clark didn’t recognise. J'onn had resumed his usual human form. 

“They were at the house” Clark said weakly trying to ask what an earth had gone on in his lost hours.

“Yes I noticed their presence as they began forming a circle around the flats” J'onn replied, “Once I managed to assess their motivations I transformed into Kara and we both flew out the house, I gave Kara instructions to come here as me the slower flyer led their helicopter on a wild chase before I vanished and came to rescue you before they figured out what had happened”

“We can’t go back there can we” Kara asked in a small voice from Clarks chest and he could only shake his head

“I did warn you both” Bruce started but was cut off by the grown men’s glares, “Fine but you can’t stay here too long, I enjoy silence” and with that he swept up the stairs to the main house, 

“He doesn’t mean that really” the boy smiled, “I’m Dick” he introduced, “Bruce adopted me last year you learn to understand his moods” 

He rocked back a little on his heels suddenly nervous, “I know it’s probably not the best time Mr. Superman but could I shake your hand?” 

Clark laughed a little, “I don’t see why not, though if I’m going to recover any I need sunlight not Bruce’s cave of darkness - perhaps a handshake of gratitude if you can help me find a chair near a window?”

Dick eargly accepted the task and soon he and Kara were sat in a drawing room together, Kara rather marvelling the old house as J'onn slunk away to talk to Bruce. 

\----

“You know it is too dangerous now” Bruce said the second J'onn walked into his office, Bruce would just bluntly say what he thought around J'onn as it was pointless to hide his thoughts or feelings on anything. 

“I know” J'onn replied, “Kara is never going to have a normal life around Clark or me, it was a pipe dream” 

“You could help her have a normal life” Bruce countered, their work over the days before Karas night terror had helped Bruce rehabilitate many of the deranged criminals he had at arkham that needed help not more jail time.

“Clark won’t be on board, she is his family” J'onn replied 

“I found her a family willing to take her” Bruce countered and threw a file down on the desk, “They have another child Kara’s age” 

J'onn sighed, “It’s going to take more than that for Clark to go...no mind for Kara to go”

Bruce looked him dead in the eyes, “Again you can help her” he paced to the other side of his desk and picked up the file to push into J'onn’s hands “Imagine just for a second that you weren’t in the house tonight, Boom, One kryptonite bullet and she's gone”

“Then how is she safer with a family with no powers at all?” J'onn countered to Bruce

“She’s only a target because of Superman and he’s only a target for information because of you” Bruce told it to him straight, “I warned you Henshaw had it out for you especially with the footage of you and Kara” 

“I’ll speak to Clark” J'onn admitted defeat and headed back to the sunny room the Kryptonians were in and he could hear them as they approached talking about what had happened,

“I can help Cousin!” Kara was saying excitedly, “I mean I managed to take down a few of the guys who were after us and if you train me more I can be just as good as you are right?”

Clark looked to her then looked up to where J'onn was, “I’ll get back to you on that Kara” he promised and then excused himself 

Clark looked up when J'onn came in and caught the look in his eye so he excused himself from Kara and together they walked to the far end of the house where they knew Kara couldn’t here. 

It was a disused room full of furniture covered in sheets but not a cobweb in sight. It was eerie complete with a large portrait that loomed over them.

J'onn passed the file to Clark and didn’t say anything as he read it, 

“J'onn” Clark started weakly but J'onn cut him off

“Just let me me the bad guy here for a second” he said, “If she stays with us best case scenario is this kind of thing maybe happening once more…” 

“Henshaws only interested in me but he is going to use the both of you wherever you are to find me, we need to split up and well Bruce found a solution”

Clark sighed he knew J'onn was right, if Kara was away from them both she would be safe, “But she won’t go”

J'onn stared at the floor, “I can erase her memories, or modify them so she never remembers this last year, like she's just arrived on the planet”

Clark took to staring at the floor next, “They seem like a nice family” he said but he choked up toward the end

“I lost my daughters before you know that, through my own stubborn pride - I’m never going to let that happen to Kara, this might be what's best for her”

Clark nodded, “When you say memory modifying?” he asked and J'onn understood the gist of the question,

“I think I’ll leave the knowledge she has gained this year, putting her back to not understanding english seems cruel I’ll make it so she studied earth when she was back on Krypton or something similar whatever fits with her narrative that doesn’t stand out to be questioned”

“So she will just think she arrived and I full on abandoned her?” Clark asked 

J'onn sighed, “I don't see a way around this, I tried to fix everything, I took their kryptonite, I wiped Henshaws memory as to your identity but I couldn’t go after everyone at the DEO, soon they’re going to go back to our house to question why they went their in the first place and it has to be destroyed before then” 

Clark just looked too emotional, “I don’t think I can”

J'onn tried to hold it together as well, “We have to for Kara, place her with this family- safe with a new name and different age we stay away make sure shes okay from a distance”

He left Clark then and he heard him fly away from the room as all the covers on the furniture whipped up slightly. 

He headed downstairs to where Kara was happily chatting with Bruce’s ward, Dick. She had insisted on not leaving without her box of photos and memories and was happily showing the boy all the memories from the last year

“Okay that looks cool” Dick commented on a photo of her and Clark posing like they had just shot out of the volcano in the distance, “You totally have to take me flying sometime!” 

“Yeah!” Kara happily agreed, “I can just about fly with Clark so you should be easy!” she grinned 

J'onn decided to leave them until Clark was back. When he returned only about an hour later he smelt a little burnt and J'onn understood he had probably torched the place.

He looked at J'onn with a dark look, “I still don’t agree with this” he ran a hand through his hair, “I couldn’t even find Karas box of pictures to save” he looked destroyed

“She has them” J onn replied and indicated the room where she was still happily sharing them with her new friend. 

“I went to meet them” Clark started a little brokenly, “Their little girl wasn’t home but they seemed great and they said I could visit whenever” he stopped short as J  
Onn shook his head 

“It might trigger her memories, you have to leave her alone distance yourself” J'onn replied, “I have to do that as well”

Clark snapped then “Yes because it is exactly the same thing for you”

J'onn ignored it Clark was just angry, he was losing the only family he had come to know. Both him and Kara in one swift afternoon. 

“Do we have to do it now?” Clark asked, “Just one more trip for ice cream or something?” he tried bargaining

“I have to be the bad guy clark i said that” J'onn repeated his earlier statement, “She will be safe, you can go back to your normal life and I will make sure to stay far away from the both of you”

“You should” Clark repeated, “I don’t think I’m going to ever be able to look you in the face after this” he said shortly and J’onn didn't need to be a mind reader to know he meant it

Excusing Dick from the room they both sat down to talk to Kara, Clark insisted on explaining but J'onn thought it would be too hard on her but Clark said he needed the closure

He explained while looking like he had just been kicked in the face, that Kara had to go and live with other people now. It wasn’t safe with either of them anymore and this recent event really proved that

Kara kicked up a fuss and began to look like she was going to run away from them when she suddenly slumped in her chair not quite unconscious but no longer physically bolting from the rom

Clark looked at J’onn in anger, “I had that!” he snarled.

J'onn just looked at him in sadness, “There was no point in it let's just do this”

“No I just.. I can’t I know its necessary but I can’t” and Clark left the room as J'onn pressed two fingers to Kara’s forehead

“Tanthu?” she questioned sleepily before J'onn put her to sleep, he was very undeserving of that title 

With the altered and erased memories all sorted in Karas head J'onn also added a small compulsion to just hide her powers. She would be safer that way he reasoned.

Kara remained asleep after he finished and he was quite surprised to find it was early morning when he opened his own eyes. He was weary and tired and collapsed into the armchair next to Karas

Clark walked in but didn’t acknowledge J'onn at all he just lifted Kara and carried her away. That was the last he saw of Clark Kent for a long time. 

J'onn remained at the mansion for awhile before he said his goodbyes to bruce and also left he headed to a place as far away as he could think from Superman and Kara and just blended in with the animals of the tropical rainforest. Henshaw was determined sure but there was no way he was finding him here.

Clark did the hard part he needed to do . He introduced himself to Kara as though for the first time and then pretty much straight away dropped her off at the Danvers household. He knew if he stuck around her he would risk everything just to keep her with him. But that everything included Karas life so he knew that it was stupid plan 

After that he headed back to metropolis dressed in the only clothes he had left and knocked on Lois’s door. They had only been dating a year but she let him stay, after all his house had just burnt down. After a month Lois didn’t want him to leave, after that she found out about who he really was and then he was never leaving.


End file.
